Chuck vs The Next Generation II: London Calling
by P.J. Murphy
Summary: Sequel to Chuck vs. The Next Generation. As John Bartowski, the son of Chuck and Sarah Bartowski, begins his college career at Cambridge and reunites with rookie Agent Samantha Collins, they find themselves confronting three rogue agents and a mysterious stranger with nefarious plans. AU with Season 5 references.
1. One Chapter Ends, The Next Begins

_Hello. It's been a while since I've done a long-form story, but I've been playing around with a few ideas. As it happens, I went back and forth between doing a sequel to **Chuck vs. the Next Generation** or another Forrest & Slade story. The F&S story will take a bit of time to develop, but I came up with what I hope is a good idea of continuing the story of John Bartowski, the son of Chuck and Sarah Bartowski. Yes, he'll be teaming up with Samantha again and it'll be a wild trip through the UK (I hope)._

_Special thanks to **BDaddyDL** for looking over some of the material and for giving me the original idea for Chuck vs. the Next Generation. As always, please leave reviews. Let me know what you think, what you like, what you don't like, don't be shy._

_Enjoy!_

* * *

_**London, United Kingdom**_  
_**May 24, 2033**_  
_**9:00 PM **__**GMT**_

Arthur Pollard took one last drag on his cigarette and threw it away. He conceded it was not the healthiest of habits…less than five percent of the nine billion people in the world still smoked…but he figured his career choice was far less healthy than a cigarette. After ten years at this, going on mission after mission, ordered around by people who cared more about politics than doing what was needed, he had grown weary of it. He wasn't a human being anymore; he was simply a tool to be used and discarded by His Majesty's Government.

But things were changing. He had a purpose now. A purpose that would bring him back to the days when this job mattered. And a lucrative purpose at that. He would certainly deliver on his end of the deal. He hoped that the other people involved were just as competent and determined at fulfilling their objectives.

He exited his car and opened the trunk, taking the weapon out of it. To the casual observer, it looked like a grenade launcher. However, a grenade launcher would be far too loud and far too messy for his assignment tonight. The people who provided the weapon promised it would do the job required and help them move forward with the first phase of their plan. The weapon Pollard held in his hand would do the trick quite nicely. Certainly Pollard preferred that to trying to take out the rumored twenty men inside the warehouse through conventional means. Then the huge cache of weapons inside the warehouse would be theirs for the taking.

He placed the protective noise-canceling headphones over his ears and placed the barrel on his shoulder. He activated the weapon and looked through the laser-guided sight to find his target inside the warehouse fifty yards away from his location. He released the safety and fired. The projectile that fired out of the barrel penetrated the outer wall and landed in the middle of the warehouse. The men inside didn't have enough time to react as the projectile released a high-pitched electronic wave. Instantly every man inside grabbed their ears in pain, but it was to no avail. The electronic waves overloaded their nervous systems and short circuited the neural pathways to their brains. All twenty men collapsed dead where they stood.

He switched the laser sight to heat-detecting to confirm nobody was moving inside the warehouse. He put the launcher back in his trunk and removed the protective headphones. He took out his iComm and dialed a number nobody but him knew about.

"The warehouse is ready."

As he heard the sounds of trucks off in the distance, ready to transport tonight's treasure to a secured location, he couldn't help but think he was finally doing something worthwhile. He was getting in on the ground floor of something that could reshape the world. No more pencil-pushers, no more fickle politics, and no more disrespect.

For the first time in a long time, a smile came across his face.

_**Santa Monica High School**_  
_**June 4, 2033**_  
_**11:30 AM PDT**_

Sarah Bartowski was typically not one to shed tears. It wasn't her style. That was not to say she hadn't done it before; she wasn't a robot. Bryce Larkin's death…both of them, as it turned out…created an emotional upheaval in her, as did the time when Chuck was captured by The Belgian, or when Jimmy Slade sacrificed his life to insure Chuck's and her survival. She was quite emotional when Chuck told her all of those stories on the beach because she had the memories of them taken away by Nicholas Quinn.

The number of times she shed tears in times of happiness could be limited to the births of her two children. And today, as she watched her son, John, graduate high school.

It still didn't feel real to her. Not in her wildest dreams did she ever think her life would end up like this. This was, in fact, the first high school graduation she ever attended. She didn't bother showing up for her own 35 years ago. The last thing she needed was to have the other students remind her that her father wouldn't be there because he was in jail. But today, as she looked across the football field at all of the graduates, she enjoyed every minute, as proud as any parent could be at seeing their child make such a tremendous accomplishment.

"And the Mel Kaufman Tri-Athlete Award is presented to John Bartowski," the principal announced.

John rose from his seat for the third time that morning, having already been announced as a Merit Scholar and winning the Glenn Ford Citizenship Award. He walked up to the stage to thunderous applause, the majority of which was provided by John Casey and Jimmy Slade, who were sitting right behind Chuck, Sarah, and their daughter, Emma. Sarah shook her head and smiled: those two made enough noise for a thousand people. Sarah couldn't help but wonder how John would feel in a few years when his two adopted daughters would go through this process. She was determined to be there just to see if John cried. As for Jimmy, he was in the same situation as her, having never attended a graduation before, not even his own. She could understand his enthusiasm, even if it was starting to give her a headache. At least both of them promised not to break out the cigars until after the ceremony was over. Thanks to them, the graduation party for both John and Emma, who had her 8th grade graduation ceremony the night before, was going to be epic. Jimmy called in a few favors to reserve the Four Seasons Beverly Hills, and one of the best catering companies in southern California was a client of Casey's. Ordinarily Sarah would have protested such extravagance, but then Sarah didn't have to worry about cleaning anything up.

As the band played Elgar's _Pomp and Circumstance_ and the graduates started to make their way up to the stage, Sarah put one arm around her husband, Chuck, who was recording the whole ceremony. She put her other arm around Emma, hugging her tightly and giving her a kiss. Four months from now, the family would travel with John to London to see him begin his college career at Cambridge. In a life that started with so few happy moments, this was the type of day that infinitely made up for it.

_**Paris, France  
May 27, 2033  
2:45 AM CEST**_

Amorette Cotuand ran her hands over the shoulders of Gaston Bonami. She knew it bothered him whenever he worked at his old computer, but she couldn't help herself. Besides, he had a lot of experience at knowing what else those hands could do, so it was rare when he protested.

They had been together for almost a year, and tonight was a big night. This would be the answer to all of their financial problems. Best of all, given how the French government taxed the living hell out of the citizenry with so little in return, Amorette felt like a modern-day Robin Hood, stealing from the rich and giving to...well, they were poor. Surely that should count.

"Almost there," Gaston said as he programmed his home computer to break into the central bank of France and make a little 'withdrawal'.

"_C'est manifique_," Amorette replied as she held his face in her hands and gave him a kiss that held a lot of promise for later. "Go get the champagne. We must celebrate!"

Gaston gave her a smile and bounded for the kitchen to pull the bottle of champagne out of the refrigerator Amorette bought earlier that day. At the computer, Amorette typed in a few numbers.

"What do you think, my darling?" Gaston said as he played some smooth American jazz on his iComm and danced towards Amorette.

She played demurely with her long, blonde hair. "I think…we should head to Rome. Then Istanbul, New Delhi, Tokyo. Then we spend a few weeks in Hollywood soaking up the sun and hanging out with the movie stars."

Gaston grinned as he placed the bottle and the two glasses next to his computer. Amorette stood as Gaston sat down. "Are you ready?"

Amorette raised an eyebrow, and then she straddled Gaston on the chair. She spun them so his hand was by the keyboard. "Trois, due, un..."

Gaston hit the [ENTER] key on the keyboard. The computer began the transfer.

"We're going to be rich!" she exclaimed as she gave him a kiss. It all seemed so simple. Gaston always talked about sticking it to 'the man', to use the American colloquialism; she simply convinced him to go through with it.

"And it's all thanks to you," Gaston replied. "I wouldn't have had the courage to try this without you."

Gaston grabbed the bottle of champagne and popped the cork. Amorette grabbed the bottle and gave Gaston a seductive look. She opened her blouse and poured some of the champagne over her chest, which Gaston lapped at like a dog that was getting his first bowl of water in days. She held the bottle above his head, and he tipped his head back as she poured some of the champagne into his mouth. Gaston's smile lit up the darkened room as Amorette put the bottle down on the table.

Gaston suddenly grabbed his throat as his breathing became restricted. He looked at Amorette in wide-eyed terror, but she calmly stood and watched as he tried to reach for her. His eyes glazed over as his breathing stopped entirely. His arm dropped limply to his side as his heart stopped beating.

Amorette checked the computer to verify the money was being transferred to the account she typed in. She took the bottle of champagne to the toilet and dumped it, flushing the toilet immediately. She looked in the mirror and took her blonde wig off, revealing the auburn hair cut in a pageboy style underneath. She placed it in her bag and went into their bedroom to retrieve the rest of her clothes. She walked back to the computer to verify the transfer was complete. She took one last look at Gaston. He was a decent-enough person and certainly he was fun in the bedroom, but he had to be eliminated. Fortunately, the poison she put in the champagne would be mistaken as a barbiturate from the medical prescription Gaston had. The police would simply think Gaston made the mistake of combining his pills with alcohol, not the first time someone had done that.

She took one last look around the flat and headed out the door. She didn't have to worry about fingerprints, since Natasha Herbert didn't technically exist and hadn't existed since joining MI-5 four years ago. One of the advantages of being an agent, even a rogue agent, was knowing how to make a clean getaway.

_**Four Seasons Hotel, Beverly Hills, CA**_  
_**June 4, 2033**_  
_**2:30 PM PDT**_

John took a look around in stunned shock. He didn't know anybody in his graduating class who had a graduation party like this. And he knew this because a lot of his classmates came up to him at the party and told him exactly that.

He had kept his mouth shut about the graduation party Emma and he were supposed to have. But Emma invited a few of her friends to it. There wasn't anything wrong with that, as John had done the same thing. However, Emma's friends took that as permission to tell every last person in their class, and eventually the rumor spread to his classmates about the huge party at the Four Seasons. Thankfully, Uncles Casey and Jimmy took it in stride and simply told the hotel and the caterers to double the number of people expected. As a result, there were over 200 people at an event originally meant for around 75.

And if John wasn't tired enough at seeing some of his classmates stare lasciviously at his mother, Emma's classmates were even less subtle about it.

"How are you holding up?"

John turned around to see Uncle Morgan and Aunt Alex behind him. "You don't look like someone who just graduated high school. You should be bouncing off the walls."

John smiled. "It's just hard to believe. It still hasn't sunk in I'll be heading to Cambridge. It's crazy."

"As opposed to rescuing your parents and taking down one of the worst criminals in U.S. history? Which is, like, totally plausible, right?" Morgan replied with a grin.

John laughed. "OK, good point, Uncle Morgan."

"How did Emma take it when your parents told her everything?" Alex asked him.

"She was…shocked. But she took it a lot better than me. I have to give her credit for that. But how did she not figure out something was wrong in Cancun with all of that extra security around?"

"She never saw 90% of the security people. They were hidden throughout the house, some posing as resort staff or groundskeepers. Then there were two couples who pretended to be old friends of mine from school who "happened" to be in Cancun at the same time. There was always someone within ten feet of us the entire week."

"Wow, that's impressive. Thanks so much for taking care of her."

"Hey, it's totally cool. I mean, your old man bailed me out in high school so much, it's…I can't even count how many times he did it. Plus, of course, giving the Buy More all of the games his company produces for next to nothing. Between that and the iComm, the stores did pretty well."

John nodded in consent. It was still a shock to him his father was actually the one to invent one of the most popular electronic devices in the world. But then, given what he now knew about his parents and all of their friends, perhaps he needed to learn not to be surprised anymore. Even Morgan was a successful businessperson, something Uncle Casey still couldn't believe to this day.

"So you finish high school, and Emma starts next August?" Alex said. "Your parents must be going out of their minds."

"Like you wouldn't believe. They discovered the hard way Emma is more of a troublemaker than I was."

"And I still stand by what I say about Morgan dropping by the house one day when your old man wasn't around," Casey grumbled as he came up behind John. "Must have caught your mother wrestling over lady feelings."

John rolled his eyes. "Really, Uncle Case? Still won't let that go?"

"Can you explain her being short and not a genius?"

"I'm doing fine in school, Uncle Casey," Emma said with considerable annoyance behind Casey.

Casey turned to her and gave a little smile. "I know, squirt. Just busting your uncle's balls a bit. You earned this party, too. It's tough to live up to an older sibling. Just ask your old man. Ellie's a total brain."

"Trapped in the body of a game show hostess," Morgan quietly mused to himself, which earned him a glare from Alex. "Old movie quote, sweetie. I promise."

"Yeah, right," Alex spat.

"Nah, it's true, Alex," Casey replied before turning to John and Emma. "One of those old movies your dad talked your mom into seeing when they started dating. Caught her watching it back when we worked in Castle. Weird seeing her tear up at it, given how many scumbags she's taken out in her career. Beats the crap movies the kids go to about good-looking vampires or zombies or aliens or whatever the hell turns the girls on these days."

"You really know how to keep up with 'us kids', Uncle Case," Emma said with a small amount of snark.

"Gee, I think I forgot to bring someone's graduation present with me," Casey playfully retorted.

Emma grinned. "I'm just kidding, Big Guy." Casey didn't mind being called that by Emma, given he was more than a foot taller than her. Nor did he mind whenever she wrapped her arms around him, like right now.

Emma looked up at him with a smile. "Russian hug, right?" Casey nodded. "Thank you for the party, too. This is awesome."

"Ah, no big deal. Client was happy to do it after we caught that dirtbag who embezzled those funds out of his company. Thank your other uncle for getting the ballroom. Most politicians don't have the connections he does."

"Where is Uncle Jimmy?" John asked.

Casey motioned to the other end of the room, where Jimmy and his wife, Alex, were talking with his parents, and Ellie and Devon. "He just got back from getting his wife at LAX."

"Excuse me," John said as several of Emma's friends pulled her away to gossip, leaving Casey to talk with his daughter and son-in-law, which was a word nobody was allowed to use around him. John crossed the room to find the group of six chatting amiably, which surprised him, as his mother was still a little annoyed at Jimmy for going overboard on the party.

"Hey everybody," John said.

"Hi, John! And congratulations!" Ellie exclaimed as she gave her nephew a hug.

"Thanks, Aunt Ellie. Oh, sorry. Thanks, Nobel Prize Winner Aunt Ellie," John replied with a smile.

"Stop that," Ellie retorted with an even bigger smile. "You don't have to keep greeting us that way. Or should I start reminding you how many of your diapers I had to change babysitting you?"

"OK, OK." While finding out his parents and their friends used to be secret agents was a major shock to the system, John was always proud of Aunt Ellie and Uncle Devon winning the Nobel Prize in medicine four years ago. After almost two decades working at the Schulman Medical Center in Chicago, they had combined to improve on the Jarvik-7 artificial heart, using the body's own nervous system to keep the battery charged and reduce rejection by the host body. The Jarvik-Schulman artificial heart was successfully implanted in a retired Tucson police officer, who still played 18 holes of golf every single day. Ellie and Devon spent most of their time on the lecture circuit now as more candidates were tested for the transplant procedure.

"How does it feel to graduate?" Devon asked him.

"Awesome," John replied in a none-too-shabby imitation of his uncle, which generated a laugh from everybody. "But I don't know. Compared to all of you, graduating high school doesn't seem like much in the grand scheme of things. I feel like a dummy standing in this group."

"Now you know what my life is like," Jimmy quipped, which earned him an instant smack upside the head from Sarah, Ellie, and Alex. "Hey, no ganging up on me."

"So, did you talk to them?" John asked Alex eagerly.

Alex expression was downcast. "I'm sorry, John." John was crestfallen before her expression reversed into a grin. "We could only get sixth row in the auditorium."

"I can go?"

"We were able to get you a ticket. You'll be there to see Sam graduate."

"Oh, I can't believe it!" John was ecstatic as he gave Alex a hug. "Thank you so much for doing this."

"You deserve it," Alex replied as she returned John's embrace. It was far easier to get an audience with the king of England than it was to see the promotion ceremony for new candidates who passed the rigorous training programs of British Intelligence. But Samantha Collins, whom John was still surprised to be the daughter of Carina Miller, would be graduating early thanks to her work in bringing down Daniel Shaw. Of course, setting every record for a female agent in agency training certainly didn't hurt her, either. Short of completely blowing off her final classes, Samantha stood to graduate as the youngest field agent in MI-5 in almost sixty years. John hadn't seen her since March, although they talked on the phone whenever they could. But this was something he had been hoping to do. He couldn't wait to see her again.

"Whoah, hang on," Jimmy said with a raised eyebrow. "Did you run it by the parental units yet?"

John's eyes widened. "Please tell me I can attend," he pleaded with Chuck and Sarah.

Chuck stared in that way parents always did when their kids wanted something. "Mmm, I don't know. You got that 'B' in differential calculus this semester.

"Oh knock it off, Chuck," Sarah said with a laugh, giving her husband a playful smack on his arm. "Of course you can go, John."

"Thanks, Mom," John replied with an ear-to-ear grin.

Sarah gave him a hug. "Alex is right, you deserve it."

Chuck also gave John a hug. "Absolutely. And I want you to remember one thing, John. One very important thing."

"What's that?"

"Plastics."

John gave his father a weird look. "Exactly how do you mean?"

"Dude, seriously?" Jimmy shot Chuck with a disbelieving glance. "That movie is older than me."

Chuck shrugged. "Still a classic."

"Yeah, so was a pet rock," Jimmy replied caustically.

"Annnnd…that's my cue to get another drink," Alex said, prompting Sarah, Ellie, and Devon to join her at the bar.

_**Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ), Cheltenham, United Kingdom  
June 1, 2033  
10:50 PM GMT**_

Tyler Cook was on his last hour in front of the computer. It had been the usual long, boring day. Keeping an eye on computer activity throughout greater London was not the sort of job one signed up for unless they really liked computers. Certainly the pay wasn't that great, and with the world a fairly quiet place these days, there wasn't much to break up the monotony.

"Heading home soon?" Grace Donloe, his supervisor, asked as she looked over his terminal.

Tyler gave a little stretch. "Soon. Just waiting for these last data packets to come in from the West End IPs."

"Well, don't stay too late. Hand it off to Charlie shift if you must. Good night."

"Good night," Tyler replied. He shook his head. His boss was a decent enough person, but she had a mere fraction of his intelligence on her best day. Yet another one of the downsides of this job.

Tyler waited until the door closed and locked behind him. The next shift wouldn't be there for five minutes, which was far more time than he needed. He opened his briefcase and took out the wireless router he was given. He took out the iComm they provided him and he studied the schematic. He had to install it in just the right place so GCHQ would never find it or detect its signal. He walked back to the large server in the room and opened the door. He pulled two of the drives out he knew were down for the evening, since computer activity in London slowed to a minimum during the nighttime. He attached the router to the server and replaced the drives. Short of taking the entire server apart, the pen-sized router he just installed would never be found, and the signal it transmitted would never be traced.

He went back to his computer and logged out for the evening. He exited the office and went downstairs to check out with security. They let him pass after a cursory look at his I.D.; the security guards knew exactly who he was. Tyler exited the building and went to his car. He pulled out the iComm again and punched in a number.

"All set, Mr. Lightman," Tyler said.

"Well done," Mr. Lightman replied. "You'll receive your next assignment soon."

Mr. Lightman disconnected from Tyler. Over the past few weeks, he added quite a bit to his empire. He had weapons, he had money, and now he had a way to access the computer systems of British Intelligence. He was off to a good start, but to bring Daemon to life, human intelligence was the most important aspect. He had a few capable intelligence pieces and plenty of manpower to handle the brute force assignments, but he would need a lot more than that. It was time to recruit.


	2. Reunited and It Feels So Good

_Hello. I'm sorry it took so long to update this, but work had to interfere, and I beta'ed several chapters of other stories as well. I'm still trying to come up with a good path to take this story, but some details have ironed themselves out. I will try to come out with the next update sooner, I promise._

_Thanks to BDaddyDL for telling me one of my lines was not exactly my best work. And he was right._

_Anyway, please read and review. I am always welcome to suggestions if you have them. In the meantime, enjoy!_

* * *

_**Chevy Chase, Maryland**_  
_**June 22, 2033**_  
_**7:30 PM PDT**_

Alex Forrest-Slade pulled her car into the driveway of her well-to-do home and sighed. She saw Jimmy's car in the garage, but that was no surprise. She found his car there every single night she came home from her office on K Street. She checked the schedule she inputted on her gComm. If she had to guess, given his penchant for cooking Italian on Wednesdays, Jimmy probably made bruschetta, Italian sausage soup with tortellini, peppered shrimp Alfredo, and was putting the finishing touches on his own version of tiramisu. And if he kept to his pattern, there would be a big bouquet of flowers waiting for her, and she would later be on the receiving end of a relaxing foot massage and not even have to worry about making sure the house was clean. There was no doubt Jimmy was the most loving and caring husband a woman could wish for.

_The rotten bastard_, she thought.

Most men would be thrilled to face retirement while they were still young enough to enjoy it. Apparently, Jimmy was not one of those men. After he left the hospital in Atlanta, he spent six weeks in rehab attempting to get his coordination back after having his spinal cord severed thanks to that evil bastard, Daniel Shaw. Alex was able to negotiate a generous retirement package for him from the President, who had to admit the money was a mere pittance given how many lives and how much money Jimmy saved for the government. Alex hoped he would take it easy, but she should have known better. Admittedly, she loved the attention he was giving her, not that he was ever a slouch in that department. She figured it would eventually taper off and Jimmy would settle down to being more like a typical husband.

Two months later, she was still waiting.

She wanted to wring his neck and gave thought to calling a divorce lawyer, but what would she tell the judge? _Your Honor, my husband has been cleaning the house, buying me flowers and cooking me dinner every day?_ She had hoped he would find some hobby to occupy his time while she continued to work at the DNI, but he didn't really have many of those. She even tried getting home late several times on purpose to ruin dinner, but he never got mad. In fact, he would pack the dinner into a plastic container for her to have at lunch the next day.

She opened the door and prepared for the assault of kindness. Right on schedule, Jimmy walked up to her with a bouquet of purple and white calla lilies, which was in the rotation of the seven different types of flowers Jimmy gave her. She had to give him credit: most guys would give a girl the same kind of flowers every day.

"Hey gorgeous," Jimmy said.

Alex gave a tired sigh and kissed him. She wasn't going to deny herself that; the man could kiss. "James, we've been through this…"

"Dinner will be ready in five minutes," he replied as he bounded into the dining room and pulled a bottle of white wine out of the refrigerator underneath the bar. He placed it on the table and handed Alex her traditional post-work drink: scotch on the rocks with a twist. She shook her head; it was like being in a circa 1960s television show…in reverse.

"James, please stop…" Alex huffed in frustration as she was interrupted by her gComm. She checked the screen to see an image of Sarah Bartowski.

"Hello, Sarah."

"Hi, Alex. How are you doing?"

"I…hate…you," Alex grumbled quietly so Jimmy wouldn't hear.

"What are you talking about?"

Alex walked into her office and closed the door. "You were the one who told James in no uncertain terms to retire. Now he's driving me up the wall!"

"What? Has he been leaving a mess around the house? He never struck any of us as much of a slob…"

"No! The guy won't relax! He doesn't have any missions to go on now. He mows the lawn every other day, and I have a service for that. The house is so clean, I could convert it to a hospital! He cooks these elaborate dinners every single night, and I'm up to my neck in flowers!"

"I thought you wanted him to retire. You were freaking out about it while he was in surgery."

"I know. I thought he would slow down. Most guys slow down in their 60s. But with him, it's like he went scuba diving in the Fountain of Youth!"

Sarah laughed. "You do realize how crazy you sound, right? Most women would kill to have husbands who were that attentive. And where was all of this whining when he'd drop by your office to bring you lunch every day?"

"That was different. He'd be there for an hour and take off. Sometimes…he'd stay for a while. A couple of times, he'd have to hide under the desk because nobody was supposed to know we were married."

Sarah noticed Alex's words becoming more measured. She was confused for a moment before the light bulb went off. "Why Alexandra Caroline Forrest-Slade. You horny little tramp," Sarah said as she started laughing hysterically.

"Oh right," Alex countered. "Like you've never had Chuck 'stop by' your office. You two work in the same building, for chrissake."

Sarah exhaled. "OK, Chuck used to 'stop by' my office from time to time. And I 'stopped by' his. And then the CFO walked in on us unexpectedly one day. That was an awkward Board of Directors meeting that week."

Alex laughed. "The Vice President won't even look me in the eye whenever we have security briefings."

Sarah froze in shock. "You mean Jimmy…while you were talking to the Vice-President?"

"Now the Vice-President. Back then, just the junior senator from Iowa."

"Oh, of course. Because that makes it less raunchy," Sarah replied sarcastically.

"He had no reason to complain. I was agreeing with everything he said."

Sarah had to hold on to her desk to not fall down from laughing herself silly. Alex's gComm beeped, and she checked the message on it.

"The head of my tech group just sent me a text," Alex said. "The completed IntComm passed all of its alpha testing. It's time to give a try with a human subject. Do you think you and Chuck can be here next week to help supervise?"

"That's why I originally called you," Sarah replied. "We figured your team would be ready ahead of schedule, and I wanted to get an update so we could plan accordingly. We were thinking about staying there through the Fourth of July."

"That sounds like a great idea. My nieces have been dying to catch up with all of you. They could take Emma sightseeing and shopping while we're at Langley."

"They won't mind?"

"Not at all."

Alex couldn't have been more proud of her nieces. Ashley followed in her father's footsteps and became an attorney for a prestigious firm in D.C. Her younger sister, Beverly, was visiting her for the summer after finishing the year teaching high school in suburban Pittsburgh. True to their sibling rivalry, Ashley became a Ravens fan the minute she heard Beverly had bought Steelers season tickets. Their parents had been tearing their hair out ever since, and Alex needling them about not being Eagles fans and bringing shame to the Forrest name didn't help one bit.

"Who have you found for testing?" Sarah asked.

"We have a group of candidates who have volunteered to try it out. Eventually all of them will, but we'll choose the first person by random draw."

Sarah paused for a moment before a huge smile came to her face. "I think it'd be safer if you tested it using someone we already know is capable of handling the Intersect. And it seems to me you could solve two problems at once."

Alex paused for a moment before a smile came to her face. "I like the way you think. OK, call me tomorrow on my private line at the office and we'll go over the details. I better get going before James tries to apologize for dinner getting cold."

"Wait. You're holding dinner up, and he's the one apolo…"

"Don't get me started," Alex huffed in tired frustration. "Bye."

Alex disconnected and walked back to the dining room. She saw Jimmy looking downcast.

"I'm so sor…"

Alex clamped her hand over his mouth. "Don't even think about it, babe." She glared at him and kept her hand over his mouth until he nodded in agreement. "I think it's time for you to un-retire."

Jimmy was confused. "You want me to go back to work? Was it something I did?"

Alex looked at all of the food on the dining room table. "You could say that."

_**Langley, Virginia  
June 27, 2033  
9:30 AM EDT**_

Chuck, Sarah, and John walked through the halls of the Central Intelligence Agency, and everybody looked at them as if the President himself just passed by. It felt weird to be this well-known by the government, but even twenty years later, people still told stories about the cold-hearted blonde agent who fell in love with a government asset and created one of the best spy teams in history.

John looked around at the marble columns and floors and people walking quickly from here to there, many of them reading information from their gComms. Some people would notice him, and the look they gave him was…John couldn't quite figure it out.

"Everybody's staring at us," John said quietly to his mother.

Sarah smiled. "It's a bit of an irony, John. We're in the middle of the biggest spy agency in the world, and yet everybody knows who we are. Even you."

"Me? I don't understand."

Chuck motioned to the people looking at John. "They're impressed with you. What you did to take down Daniel Shaw? And you're just starting college."

John shrugged. "But I really didn't do anything. The Intersect did all of the work."

Sarah wrapped an arm around John. "Believe me, sweetie, you did a lot more than that," she said as she gave him a kiss.

They turned the corner and ran into Kristin Collier, the Deputy Director at the DNI. "Chuck, Sarah, it's good to see you again," Kristin said pleasantly as she shook their hands.

"You too, Kristin," Chuck replied. "How's everything going?"

"Not bad. It's been pretty quiet around here. Well, until today, that is." She turned to John. "And is this the young man everybody's been talking about for the last three months?"

Sarah nodded with a smile. "This is our son, John."

Kristin shook his hand. "I am honored. That was excellent work in Atlanta to take down that monster Shaw."

"I just really wanted to get my parents back," John said shyly.

Kristin gave a little laugh. "You sound just like your father: very humble." She handed John a stylus and projected an image on her gComm onto a small screen on the table. "I just need you to sign a few forms. Non-disclosure agreements. Basically you promise not to reveal to anybody what you see, hear, or say here."

"Can I get a look at those?" Sarah asked with a bit of suspicion.

"Of course, but John will have to sign them since he's already turned eighteen. Don't worry, Sarah. We didn't slip any paperwork in there to recruit him into the Agency. We know he's off to Cambridge this fall."

Sarah relaxed her posture as she glanced over the documentation. She nodded to John, who signed in the box projected by the gComm.

"Thank you, John," Kristin said as she filed the paperwork and turned off her gComm. "And now we're ready to have some fun. Alex and Jimmy are waiting."

The four walked down the corridor and took the elevator to the basement. They walked down a long, Spartan-like hallway until they came to a set of double doors. Kristin touched her ID to the scanning plate, and the doors opened. Everybody stepped inside to see a large gymnasium with a significant amount of computer equipment and monitors set up on one side of it. Several large mats covered the floor in the middle of the gymnasium, and along the wall opposite of the computer equipment was a storage rack containing a large cache of various types of weaponry: guns, knives, and even a few fencing epees.

"Chuck! Sarah!"

Chuck, Sarah, John, and Kristin turned to see Alex Forrest-Slade waving at them as she entered the gym from the door on the opposite side from them. The four walked across the gym to greet them. As they got together, Jimmy Slade emerged from the locker room wearing a t-shirt and sweatpants, looking ready to get quite a workout.

The four exchanged hugs. "Did Ashley and Beverly get Emma?" Alex asked.

Chuck nodded painfully. "And somewhere in the Georgetown section of D.C., my credit card is screaming and begging for mercy."

Jimmy laughed. "Yeah, that sounds familiar. We decorated Beverly's first apartment in Pittsburgh. Let me tell you; the Forrest family has some seriously expensive tastes."

"Says the man who wears $3,000 suits and spends forty-five minutes every morning shellacking his hair so not a single one is out of place?" Alex countered acidly.

"That's when I was an agent," Jimmy replied crossly.

"True. Now it's only forty minutes."

"Anyway," Chuck said to end their annoying argument. "Can I have a look at the IntComm to make sure everything's working OK?"

"Sorry, Chuck. Of course," Alex replied as she gestured to a small table near the computer equipment. Chuck walked over and scanned the code running on the computer that was hooked up to the IntComm.

"You weren't expecting us to mess with the code, were you Chuck?" Alex asked with a raised eyebrow.

He shrugged. "We've had…problems in the past with the government changing something of ours."

"No sweat," Jimmy replied. "I told Alex the story you told me all those years ago about the NSA changing you father's Intersect on him. I said you wouldn't be too happy if they tried that again. The only thing they did was update the data files."

Chuck nodded. "You're right. I guess that's the advantage of working with the government instead of for the government." He detached the IntComm from the computer. "Ready?"

Jimmy nodded, and Chuck walked over to him. Jimmy put on the glasses and activated the IntComm. Both of them walked over to Alex, who opened her briefcase and took out several folders.

"What are those?" John asked.

"I have several test pictures that should invoke a flash on the IntComm," Alex replied. "James has never seen these pictures, so he should be able to identify the hidden information inside of them."

"How?"

"The glasses have sensors that follow your retina and scan whatever it is they're looking at," Jimmy replied. "If the IntComm finds a hit, the information displays the images in the glasses for the user to see. For example…"

Jimmy nodded, and Alex opened up the first folder to an image. Jimmy stared at it for a moment before receiving the information.

"Xiang Wan Chu, Chinese nationalist, suspected to be developing an electromagnetic pulse wave bomb for an East Asian terrorist group." Alex flipped to the next picture. "Eduardo Salazar, former Basque separatist, rumored to be working for the Janus crime syndicate in Kazakhstan." She flipped to another picture. "Dorothy Mathers, former CIA asset, supposedly killed on a yacht in the south of France."

Jimmy turned to Alex. "Emphasis on supposedly," he said, prompting Alex to make a few notes with her gComm. She flipped to the final picture. "Stephen Lightman, former member of The Ring, supposedly helped Volkoff Industries launder money and was a weapons supplier for Nicholas Quinn. Current whereabouts unknown."

"Four out of four," Alex replied with a smile. "You even got us some new information on Mathers."

"Wow," John said. "The Intersect knew all of that?"

Jimmy nodded as he took off the glasses. "In the right hands, this thing could save countless lives. Unfortunately, in the wrong hands it could destroy that many, too." He paused momentarily and shook his head. "Gee, not too Jor-El there, was I?"

"Actually, I was thinking Peter Parker's Uncle Ben from Spider-Man," Chuck quipped. He softened his voice to make it more soothing. "With great power comes great responsibility, son."

Alex gave Sarah a sideways glance. "Thanks a lot," she grumbled.

"No, no. You can't pin this on my husband," Sarah replied. "Jimmy came to us pre-nerded."

"So, the data in the Intersect works. Now what?" John asked.

Alex turned to Kristin and nodded. Kristen walked towards the locker rooms and knocked on one of the doors. Jimmy walked out to the middle of the gym floor and began to stretch on one of the mats. Kristen led a group of eight people dressed in similar workout clothes to Jimmy to the middle of the mats.

"All of these people volunteered to fight Jimmy?" Sarah asked Alex.

"I told them I would personally give a $25,000 bonus to any person who could defeat James."

Sarah's eyes widened in concern. "Does Jimmy know that?"

Alex smiled. "Now where would the fun be in telling him? Besides, if Chuck's as half as good of a programmer as he says he is, that money should be safe, right?"

Jimmy took the IntComm and punched in a few commands. He froze momentarily as several dozen images flashed in the Intersect glasses. He took them off and handed the IntComm to Kristin.

"Ready?" he asked the eight volunteers, all of whom looked eager to collect that bonus.

Two of the volunteers ran at him, one attempting to throw a punch and the other attempting to sweep his leg. Jimmy jumped backwards and landed on his hands to avoid both the punch and the leg sweep, kicking outward in both directions to knock both of them down. One person leapt into the air to land a flying roundhouse kick, which Jimmy ducked under, following it up with a leg sweep of his own to trip the person the second they landed. Two new volunteers flew at him and managed to tackle him to the ground. However, Jimmy quickly looped his hands under their arms and somersaulted backwards, pushing both of them off at the same time. He flipped himself back to a standing position just in time to deflect a butterfly kick one volunteer sent at him and jumped to avoid two of the people on the ground trying to trip him. The last two volunteers came at him, but Jimmy dove forward and did a barrel roll, which tripped the two people, causing them to fall into the pile of volunteers behind him.

Jimmy got to his feet, turned, and looked at the group of volunteers strewn around on the mats.

"Ready any time you are," he said matter-of-factly.

Kristin handed Jimmy the Intersect glasses, which he put on. He programmed the IntComm to purge his skills. A series of images flashed through the glasses, and Jimmy took them off.

"That was amazing," John said.

Jimmy shrugged. "Eh, the barrel roll was a little weak. I should have used an _uki goshi_ on the last two. A good floating hip throw would have worked better. I must be getting old."

John rolled his eyes and turned to Sarah. "Mom, can I…"

"Definitely."

"Thanks," John replied…and smacked Jimmy upside the head.

Jimmy growled and glared at Sarah. "No. No way. The rule does not extend to him," Jimmy spat.

"Anyway," Alex interrupted. "Let's try the autoloader. Chuck, any objections?"

"None at all. I'm curious to see if this worked."

"The autoloader?" Kristin asked.

"It was Jimmy's idea. The glasses can scan whatever situation the user is in and automatically load whatever skills he or she needs."

"But what if they needed a whole lot of different skills at once?" John asked. "Couldn't that be dangerous to the person using the IntComm?"

"There's a safety feature built in so the Intersect knows the maximum amount it can give to the user. Since the Intersect first scans the retina of the person wearing the glasses, it would then have the neurological workup on them."

"That also locks the Intersect so nobody else can use it," Jimmy added. "That way, someone stealing the IntComm won't gain anything. If an unauthorized user puts on the glasses, the IntComm self-destructs."

Jimmy took the IntComm and booted the autoloader program as the volunteers got to their feet. Kristin walked over to the storage rack of equipment and wheeled it to the edge of the mat.

"OK, not everybody at once this time," Jimmy told the volunteers as he put the Intersect glasses on. "We just need to see if the autoloader gives me the right programs. So one at a time, but be sure to mix things up."

The first volunteer grabbed two bo staffs and tossed one to Jimmy. He looked at it with the glasses when the IntComm flashed the appropriate images at him. The volunteer came at him, and Jimmy blocked him with his bo staff. The volunteer kept swinging away, but Jimmy blocked every shot. Jimmy blocked one final overhead shot from the volunteer, flipped the bo staff into one hand, and jerked his arm upward, knocking his opponent's staff out of his hand. Jimmy gently touched the chest of his opponent, who conceded defeat. Two other volunteers grabbed fencing epees, and Jimmy froze momentarily as one program was erased from his mind and a new one downloaded. He ran over to grab two epees of his own and swung away, keeping both of his opponents at bay.

"You are using Bonetti's Defense against them," Chuck said to Jimmy with a smile.

"I thought it only fitting considering the rocky terrain," Jimmy replied as he went on the attack against his two opponents.

"Then you must be expecting them to attack with Capo Fero."

"Naturally. But I find Thibault cancels out Capo Fero, don't you?" Jimmy smiled as he combined a lunge with an opposition parry to knock both epees out of his opponents' hands.

"Are these two always like this?" Alex asked Sarah, who only shrugged in return. "No wonder John Casey was always grumpy around them."

The two volunteers picked up their epees and put them away as one final volunteer grabbed a pair of six-inch knives and went on the attack. The IntComm downloaded the right program to Jimmy, who used his knee to deflect the first knife and pivoted quickly to avoid the second one. He grabbed hold of the volunteer's wrist and twisted it, forcing him to drop the knife. He kicked it away as his opponent lunged at him one final time. Jimmy swung his arm to defect the lunge and grabbed the man, using a hip check to throw him to the ground, hanging onto the man's wrist until the impact jarred him enough to let go of the knife.

Jimmy pulled the man to his feet and bowed to the group of volunteers, who begrudgingly walked back to the locker room in defeat, their wallets un-augmented for their efforts.

"At the risk of sounding like Neo, whoah."

"Wow. Nicely done, Uncle Jimmy," John said. "Any chance I can give it a shot?"

Jimmy programmed the IntComm to purge the skills from his head. "Sure, if you want to give your poor mother a coronary."

John turned to Sarah. "Please, Mom? I've had the full thing in me before. This wouldn't even be a fraction of that."

Sarah's expression alternated between a worried mother and an agent. Not for the first time, the two were in direct conflict with each other. "Chuck, what do you think?"

Chuck put his hands up in surrender. "He does have a point about being able to handle it. Besides, it's just one sparring session."

Sarah stared at John for a long moment. "OK, but only one session. Martial arts only. No weapons, no crazy stunts. Go against Uncle Jimmy."

"Here you go," Jimmy said as he handed John the Intersect glasses. "It's all set for you."

John put on the glasses, and the IntComm loaded the correct program into his mind. John took off the glasses and walked to the middle of the mat where Jimmy was waiting patiently.

"Ready?" Jimmy asked.

John nodded and got into a defensive stance. Jimmy sent a half-speed punch at John, who quickly deflected it and grabbed his arm, flipping him to the ground. Jimmy quickly got up and ducked out of the roundhouse kick John delivered. Jimmy tripped John's planted foot, sending him to the ground. John pushed up with his hands and backflipped to a standing position. He faked another roundhouse kick at Jimmy, who took the bait and ducked. John swept his leg to knock Jimmy off of his feet.

Jimmy stood up as John gestured for him to attack again. Jimmy went full throttle, attempting to land punch after punch, each of which John blocked. He tried a front kick, and John grabbed his foot, flipping him onto the mat. Jimmy got up and attempted a roundhouse kick. John pivoted out of its way and sent an elbow into Jimmy's back, knocking him off balance. Jimmy righted himself and tried a flying back kick. John leaped into the air and somersaulted over Jimmy, much to the shock of everyone watching. Jimmy landed first with his back to John, but John's speed let him land and sweep his leg. Jimmy went flying through the air and landed hard on his back. John pinned his arm down and put his knee on Jimmy's chest in triumph. Everybody applauded.

"Thank you. You're far too kind," John said demurely. "Wet Willie," he added, sticking his saliva-covered pinky finger in Jimmy's ear. Jimmy growled momentarily before John got off of him and pulled him to his feet with a huge grin on his face.

"That…was impressive," Jimmy said as he wiped off his ear. He looked at everybody else, who were still in awe of John's performance.

"How was that?" John asked.

"Incredible, John," Chuck replied. "Better than any of us."

Sarah exhaled. "Now I'm really glad you chose to go to college."

"I'm not." Alex shook her head. "Cambridge's gain is definitely our loss."

_**MI-5 Headquarters, London  
**__**August 5, 2033  
**__**11:00 AM GMT**_

Samantha Collins thought she would be nervous, but she wasn't. She had wanted this since the day her mother, Carina, told her the truth about what she did. How she worked in law enforcement in the States, how she ended up working for the CIA, and eventually ending working for MI-6. She found out about her mother's friends and how they had saved the world on numerous occasions. And now she would be a part of that world, starting two years sooner thanks to her contributions to taking down Daniel Shaw and keeping the IntComm safe. The last five months had been a whirlwind of activity to get her final tests in…all of which she aced, naturally…but today was the big day. She would take the oath and begin her work as a field agent.

Although she had to admit it wasn't all peaches and cream. She missed John.

In meeting all of her mother's friends, she knew they were a special group. And even though she figured John Bartowski would be a special person, she never anticipated finding out just how special she was. Few people in the world had that combination of confident-yet-awkward that made him so endearing. But no matter what happened to them, no matter how low Daniel Shaw was willing to go to see all of them die, John never gave up. The thought may have crossed his mind once or twice, but to show the bravery John did in the face of danger with no prior experience at all was nothing short of astonishing. And at the end of the day, he still didn't consider himself anybody special.

She begged to differ…greatly.

"Just for the record, I still hate you," Michelle Jarvis said. Samantha turned around, not at all surprised to see the big grin on her friend's face.

Samantha smiled. "Hey, you'll be joining me before too long in the field."

"Yeah, if two years isn't considered long," Michelle replied with a bit of jealousy. "Technically, I should get some credit for helping you with that mission."

Samantha raised an eyebrow. "Oh, I'm sure it was complete torture for you, having to take John's cute friend back to your dorm room."

"Who never called me back, by the way."

"You didn't give him your number."

"Don't change the subject," Michelle quickly replied. Both of them looked at each other and smiled.

"Take care of yourself out there," Michelle said as she gave Samantha a hug. "I hope we get to see each other again."

"We will," Samantha replied as a few tears welled in her eyes. "That I promise."

Michelle walked back to her dorm room as Samantha went out on stage. Four other agents stood with her, all of whom would be sworn in with her. They didn't say much to her, as most of them felt some jealousy, either because she was a good two years younger than them or that she had eclipsed many of the records her older colleagues had set.

The head of British Intelligence and the Lord Chancellor appeared on the stage, and the audience rose to acknowledge their presence. Samantha couldn't see past the first two rows, so she did not know if her mother was in the audience. Only a select few could witness this ceremony, and her mother had to go through a lot of red tape if she were to be one of those people. She put that out of her mind, as the swearing-in ceremony was quite short.

"Please raise your right hand," the Lord Chancellor announced. Samantha took out the card containing the oath. She was to go first, as each agent said the oath alone and they went alphabetically.

She took a deep breath and read from the card. "I, Samantha Eleanor Collins, swear by Almighty God that I will be faithful and bear true allegiance to His Majesty King William, his heirs and successors and that I will as in duty bound honestly and faithfully defend His Majesty, her heirs and successors in person, crown and dignity against all enemies and will observe and obey all orders of His Majesty, his heirs and successors."

Samantha stepped back as the other four agents read their oaths one by one. She could feel herself shaking inside. She wasn't worried about the danger, as no one ever went into this line of work expecting a long, healthy life. She was more worried about living up to the standards her mother and her friends had set in this business. She couldn't deny they set the bar very high.

The ceremony ended, and Samantha walked down the stairs to get a look at the crowd. She was shocked to find her mother, Chuck, Sarah, Casey, Gertrude, Jimmy, and Alex applauding her.

And at the end of the row clapping the loudest was John.

Samantha raced up the stairs as John exited the row. She leaped into his arms and hugged him tightly.

"My God, how did you get in?" Samantha was barely able to contain her delight.

"Aunt Alex pulled a few strings," John replied.

"This is…thank all of you so much for being here."

"I knew I wanted the biggest audience I could get for this," Carina said as she hugged her daughter. "I am so proud of you."

"Thanks, Mom. This is so wonderful. Can we all go out and celebrate?"

"That was the plan all along," Jimmy replied with a grin.

"OK, let me go get my stuff from the dorm. John, do you want to come with? You might want to get used to see what dorms look like. You'll be in one at Cambridge, right?"

"Um, sure," John replied and turned to his parents. "If that's OK."

"We can catch a cab to the restaurant," Samantha quickly added.

"We'll see you there," Chuck said.

"Thanks again, everybody," Samantha quickly said, giving her mother a kiss and taking John's hand to lead him to the dormitories.

"Uh, quick question," Casey said quietly as he elbowed Chuck. "You already had 'the talk' with him, right?"

"Of course," Chuck replied. "Why do you ask?"

Casey shook his head at Chuck's naiveté. "If you haven't, it's too late now."

-/^\-

Samantha and John walked over to Ferguson Hall and took the elevator to the tenth floor. They walked down the hallway, and Samantha touched her ID card to the lock. She opened the door and John followed her inside. He barely had the door closed when Samantha leapt into his arms, her lips crashing down on his. John was caught by surprised but caught up immediately, running his fingers through her auburn hair as their kissing increased exponentially in passion.

"I can't tell you how much I've missed you," Samantha whispered hotly into his ear as she feasted on his neck, wrapping her legs around him.

"I've missed you, too," John panted.

"It's only fair to warn you, John."

"What?"

She ripped his shirt open and started undoing his belt. "I stole my mother's handcuffs. I thought I'd have to wait until October to use them, but…"

"I promise, you won't need them," John replied as he unzipped her dress.

"Who says we won't?"

_**The Palm Tree, Mile End, London  
**__**August 10, 2033  
**__**11:00 PM GMT**_

Tony Furlan and Grace Sullivan waited patiently for their contact. There were rumors of a new terrorist group attempting to make their mark in London, but they had little to go on at the moment. MI-5 got a flash memo that their boss said was a priority one from the head of the agency himself.

The barmaid put two pints of lager down in front of them. Both of them moved the mugs to the side as they continued to look around. They ordered the beers to fit in with the crowd, but neither of them liked to imbibe on the job.

The barmaid knew that, too. That's why she coated the outside of the glasses with the fast-acting poison rather than putting it in their drinks.

Four men made their way through the pub. When they stopped at the table where the now-dead agents were, they pulled them up and quietly took them out the back.

The barmaid got out her iComm and dialed a number. "It's done, Mr. Lightman."

"Very good, Natasha," was Lightman's reply. "Make sure the glasses are cleaned properly."

Natasha Herbert disconnected the call and began the cleanup to throw investigators off of her scent. In a flat ten kilometers from the bar, Lightman made a few notes into his computer. The flash memo he created worked to perfection. And now it would simply be a matter of time before rumors start spreading the two agents were sold out by British Intelligence.


	3. New Kids in Town

_Hello. Just publishing the latest chapter to my story. I'm trying to cut down the time between updates, but I have a few things going on in my personal life that have been taking center stage of late, so it's been tough finding the time to write. Also, I'm trying to nail down the direction I want to take the story. I have a few thoughts on that, and you'll see those start to develop in this chapter. I hope to have the next chapter up and written by next week or the following week at worst. Hopefully, that'll be an improvement over the three weeks it took this time, which was an improvement over the month it took to get Chapter 2 out. I'm trying, I really am. :-D_

_Again, thanks to **BDaddyDL** for letting me bounce a few ideas off of his head. He's a very busy person, so I always appreciate him giving me some time to run a few ideas by him._

_As always, please leave reviews. Writers love to know that you're reading their stories. It's what keeps us going and inspires us to come up with new ideas. Actually, I already have a third Next Gen story I may try. But let's see how this one goes first._

* * *

_**Ferguson Hall, MI-5 Headquarters, London  
August 5, 2033  
1:00 PM GMT**_

John was pretty certain he was paralyzed. He couldn't move, and the big smile on his face would not go away. He wanted to get out of bed but he didn't have the strength.

Not that he minded much. The reason for the big smile on his face was lying naked on top of him with an equally big smile on her face.

His breathing had finally returned to normal. He hadn't seen Samantha in almost five months, and it was hard to concentrate on anything else in all that time. He could attribute his B in Differential Calculus to the number of late-night phone calls to Samantha to see how she was doing. Thankfully, his parents didn't keep tabs on his phone usage like they had been for Emma with all of the boys calling her for dates. Samantha and John talked about everything…or at least as much as she could reveal about agent training in British Intelligence. Fortunately, John picked up his father's gift of gab somewhere down the line, and Samantha was quite content to just listen.

"I think we're in big trouble," John said, although the smile on his face didn't fade one iota. "If our parents and their friends haven't guessed what we've been doing by now, they'd have to be the dumbest people on the planet."

"I blame you," Samantha replied, her grin a little more on the wicked side. "You're too cute and you've got that athletic build and are completely unselfish between the sheets. It's impossible to resist you. You took advantage of an oversexed girl with your boyish charms and your killer body."

"Oh, I did not. Besides, you were the aggressor most of the time."

"By the way, since you said it to me enough times, should I just have my name legally changed to God?"

"Can you blame me? Some of the things you did to me defy the laws of physics."

"Look who's talking! At least I'm still nice enough to call you by your proper name."

"That's because I make it easy on you. John. It's one syllable. I have to remember three syllables. How many guys do you know who can even remember what day it is when they're having sex? Especially with someone as incredible and wild as you?"

"What can I say? It pays to be in shape. Those Pilates and advanced yoga classes really came in handy. I didn't know I could bend that way."

"I didn't know ANYBODY could bend that way."

Samantha laughed. "Oh, stop it," she said as she started kissing along his neck and caressing his chest.

"Mmmm, we really should get dressed and meet everybody," John said with a sigh. Samantha kept kissing his chest and running her hands all over him. "They're waiting for us." Her hand proceeded lower, making John's sense of responsibility fade quickly. "You're not even listening to me."

"Not even a little," Samantha hotly whispered into his ear and tickled it with her tongue.

"What will our parents say?" John moaned as he lost the battle of wills.

"Come on. They know what we're doing and they've been friends for over twenty years. How could they possibly get mad?"

_**Elements Restaurant, Southwark, London  
August 5, 2033  
1:15 PM GMT**_

The staredown had been going on for almost thirty minutes. If they weren't looking at each other, they were looking at the two empty chairs saved for John and Samantha. Anticipating a potential problem, Casey, Gertrude, Jimmy, and Alex made sure there were plenty of tables, chairs, and human beings separating Sarah from Carina. Never in his life did Chuck see Carina as upset as she was now. And the fact she was upset at his wife made things even more uncomfortable.

"Show him her dorm room?" Sarah asked in an accusatory tone.

"And who was the one to let him go, may I ask?" Carina countered. "Don't try to tell me your son is so sheltered that he didn't know what she wanted. They've been talking to each other since March."

"Two more scotches," Casey tiredly called to their server. "On second thought, just bring the entire bottle."

Gertrude elbowed his ribs. "Oh, please. Remember the movie we took the girls to last week? You growled away any boy who even came near Olga and Natalya. You can't blame Sarah and Carina for not wanting their children to do anything crazy."

"Yeah, I'd see how you're such an expert at living a quiet life. When did you bed your first mark? Sixteen or seventeen?"

"Casey!" Sarah said angrily. "This is not about what any of us did! I want my son to live a normal, quiet life. I know Samantha's a great girl, but she's going to be an agent, and I really don't think it's a good idea for an inexperienced civilian to be with someone who is trained to be a spy."

"Gee, thanks honey," Chuck replied quietly, slinking further into his seat.

"That was different," Sarah snapped. "You were 26 when I met you. John is only 18 and hasn't even started college."

"OK, none of us will win a Saint of the Year Award," Alex interjected in a calm voice. "Can either of you say you never went to bed with someone at their age?" Both Sarah and Carina begrudgingly shook their heads. "So both of you will look like hypocrites if you try to get in their faces about this."

Carina exhaled in frustration. "You're right, Alex. But someone has to talk to them. Maybe someone who didn't go out on dates at their age or didn't have friends to hang out with."

Everyone turned towards Jimmy. "Oh, shut up!" he growled as everyone but Sarah broke up in laughter.

Jimmy turned to Sarah. "Sarah, John's a really good kid. He's had girlfriends before, right? This is no different. We tried to help him as best as we could when rescuing you two, but Sam really did the heavy lifting. She kept him calm and focused. In a situation like that, the two of them couldn't help but become closer. I doubt either of them is in it just for fun. I'd bet dollars to doughnuts they're in it for the long haul."

"Jimmy's right," Carina added. "Samantha is much more responsible than I was at her age."

"Define backhanded compliment…" Casey muttered under his breath, earning a glare from both Alex and Gertrude.

Sarah was still fuming as John and Samantha walked up to the table. The entire group stared at them, and they quietly took their seats.

"So…" John said sheepishly, concentrating on the menu so he didn't have to look at anybody. "Did everybody already order?"

Sarah glared at John and Samantha but didn't say a thing. Everybody else avoided eye contact.

"John, there comes a time in every young man's life when…" Jimmy started, only to be smacked upside the head by Casey. "Finally, I get hit for a good reason," Jimmy grumbled.

Sarah's eyes continued to shoot daggers at her son. Even though she knew John had dated before and even had a steady girlfriend while he was a junior, knowing what he was doing with Samantha was still a tough pill for any mother to swallow, regardless of what she may have done at his age. Suddenly, the anger started to fade a bit. She felt Chuck's hand holding hers as he rubbed his thumb against her palm. She turned in his direction and saw that same dulcet look in his eyes that helped her so many times in her life, such as when they danced at Ellie and Devon's wedding, or when he promised to find her dream house or when Daniel Shaw captured her.

"John," Sarah began quietly, attempting to keep everyone else out of the conversation. "It's difficult for me to talk about this, especially since you didn't know who I really was all of this time and some of things I did would never qualify me as a role model. But as a mother, I'm not immune to not wanting my child to grow up too quickly. And when she knows her son…"

Sarah fumbled with her words and simply gestured between John and Samantha. Chuck gave her other hand a gentle squeeze under the table, and she found the courage to continue. "But I…I just want to make sure that there is something…there…between Samantha and you. It would be comforting to me that you believe there is a true connection between the two of you and you're not just out there being irresponsible."

John felt a bit flustered. He didn't know how to react because he wasn't even sure if Samantha felt the same way about him he felt about her. However, Samantha interlacing her fingers in his under the table and squeezing his hand tightly gave him the answer. "I understand what you mean, Mom," he finally said. "And trust me; I think we might be serious about this."

Sarah sat back in her chair and exhaled slowly. The glare that had been in her eyes since John and Samantha sat down was gone. And the tension around the table ebbed with it. Everybody started looking at their menus.

"Just make sure you used…" Casey growled.

"We did, Uncle Casey," John quickly replied, his eyes widened in mortification. "We did."

_**Surbiton Cemetery, Kingston Upon Thames, London  
August 30, 2033  
11:30 PM GMT**_

Carolyn Hurley looked around nervously. Ordinarily a ten-year veteran of MI-5 wouldn't be nervous even in a cemetery at night. However, a number of rumors had spread recently throughout the Agency regarding the disappearance of Tony Furlan and Grace Sullivan in the last three weeks. Rumors were nothing new to British Intelligence; Carolyn even enjoyed the fact that office politics were just as prevalent in her job as any normal job. However, the lack of details regarding their disappearance was frustrating. No agent ever wanted to see one their own killed, even if they didn't know them. She knew some of the 'cover stories' the SIS used when their agents were killed in the line of duty; she could even tell the way they died by the story that was released. However, not even that had happened. Something about it didn't feel right.

Her contact would be here soon. He was quite vague on the phone, but she had cultivated this contact over the years and kept him off of the books. MI-5 didn't even know his name, where he lived, or what he did for a living. They kept in contact with each other through email accounts they changed every week and a device that would mask the IP address of the computers they used. Although cyber cafés fell out of style several years ago, the occasional one could still be found in case the metro wi-fi connections didn't work. Her contact had some information for her that he promised was worth the wad of cash she had in an envelope in her hand. Plus, he knew she would be quite displeased if the information didn't pan out. And one did not want to be the cause of a displeased agent, particularly one with Carolyn's skills.

She only heard the faintest hint of a whoosh, something only the best-trained agents in the world would have picked up on. And she only picked up on it a microsecond before her world suddenly went black. Blood soaked the small grouping of headstones where Carolyn stood mere seconds ago, her lifeless body now in a place now apropos for it.

Arthur Pollard approached the body lying in the grass. The L115A3 long range sniper rifle did its job to perfection. He activated a signal scrambler on his belt designed to block any radio signals for a two-hundred yard radius. He placed rubber gloves on his hands and reached into Carolyn's purse. He found the emergency callout signal and placed it in her hand, curling her fingers around it. He activated it, but the signal wouldn't be picked up until he took his scrambler out of range. He then walked back to the place where he fired the shot. From a plastic bag, he took a handful of fibers and scattered them in the grass. If the investigators did their jobs well, they would deduce the fibers were from a Ghillie suit made for snipers at Fort Benning in Georgia and for snipers with the British Army. Combined with the memo Tyler Cook implanted in the file systems at MI-5 requesting a trainee from the Sniper System Improvement Programme (SSIP), it would turn quite a number of heads in the wrong direction.

Once the incident made its way through the SIS, it would be time to shake the trees and see if any fruit fell off.

_**Mill Road, City Centre, Cambridge, UK  
September 28, 2033  
11:30 AM GMT**_

John carried the last 2 suitcases up the stairs to his apartment on the third floor. Despite being a high school athlete, he was still quite winded. His parents and he had made the trip up the stairs a dozen times already, carrying the TV, refrigerator, bed, couch, chairs, and endless supplies he would need for the spacious-for-a-college-student apartment he would be renting for the next year or four. Endless mostly to his mother acting like a mother who was dropping off her first child at college. But no matter how much it annoyed him, it was to be expected.

After arriving at Heathrow last night and staying in a hotel near the airport, Chuck, Sarah, and John rented a truck and picked up the items they bought online at a local store and drove them up the M11 to the apartment they found through a local real estate agent Carina recommended. Although the apartment wasn't furnished, it was in a great area and was walking distance to plenty of shops and restaurants as well as the university itself. The fact it was also close to several pubs popular among the students was a nice feature he chose not to share with his parents.

"OK, that's the last of it," John said with a huff as he put his suitcases down. He walked into the bedroom to see his parents putting the sheets on the bed. "Mom, Dad, you don't have to worry about doing that. I can handle it."

"Oh, really?" his mother said with a raised eyebrow. "If I left this to you, I could come back here in two months and you'd still be sleeping right on top of the mattress."

"I make my bed at home," John protested.

"But this is college, and I won't be looking over your shoulder. Believe me, that old adage is true: when the cat's away, the mice will play."

"Mom, please..."

She finished straightening the pillows and looked at her son. "Do you mind if I get some quality mothering in before I have to return home? Just indulge me, will you?"

John smiled. "You spent most of last night at Aunt Carina's house cooking up three weeks' worth of dinners for me that are stuffed into that little freezer, and I have a meal plan with the university. Believe me, nobody would ever think of revoking your Mom card."

Chuck laughed as he put on his coat. "Come on, honey," he said to Sarah. "You can't miss him if you don't leave."

Sarah exhaled. Her own first day at college didn't feel like this because she was still getting over the shock the federal government told her only three months before they would pay her way through Harvard. By contrast, she knew for years that this day would come. The day her baby would leave the nest.

"OK. Be safe, sweetie," Sarah said as she hugged John tightly, shaking a bit as she embraced him. "I love you."

"Love you too, Mom," John replied gently, trying to keep his own emotions in check.

"Take care, son," Chuck said as he gave John a hug. "We've never been more proud of you."

"Thanks, Dad."

Chuck and Sarah walked out of John's apartment and walked down the stairs of the old building, which like many buildings in the area, never installed elevators. They exited the building on the street level and headed back to the moving truck. Sarah stopped and looked up at the floor where John's apartment was.

"Are you OK?" Chuck asked her gently.

Sarah nodded, although her eyes were welling up quickly. "I'm fine," she lied.

Chuck gave a gentle smile and pulled her into his embrace. Sarah broke down crying in his arms. Damn that wonderful nerd she married over twenty years ago. She never liked to cry, no matter how much the situation warranted it, and he always managed to coax it out of her.

"I miss him too, sweetie," Chuck said softly into her ear as his frame enveloped her.

"God, I'm so embarrassed," she said quietly, trying to choke back a few tears. "I knew this day was coming. This is what we've always wanted for him. Why am I acting like a blubbering idiot?"

Chuck laughed tenderly. "Baby, the day you stop being emotional about things like this is the day I start worrying about you."

Her grip on Chuck intensified to the point of fracturing a few ribs. After a few minutes, she wiped her tears away and looked up at him. "You gave me this moment. A moment I never dreamed I could have. You've given me so many moments that made me so happy."

She slid her hands over his cheeks and held his face tightly. "I know how you get annoyed when I worry I don't say 'I love you' enough. But that's only because it can't be said enough. I love you more than you could ever know."

She pulled his face down to hers and put every last ounce of energy into giving him a passionate kiss, her hands running through his hair. He held onto her on that city block as they expressed their love for each other, the rest of the world be damned.

_**Mill Road, City Centre, Cambridge, UK  
September 30, 2033  
8:00 PM GMT**_

John pressed the fingerprint identification pad to his apartment, and the door unlocked. He thought it funny they could install high-tech security like that and yet not figure out how to put in an elevator. It didn't matter much to him, but other residents in the building weren't in as good of shape…especially when they came home from the pubs after closing time…and they sometimes struggled getting up the stairs to their apartments.

He tried calling Samantha a couple of times, but her iComm would go to voicemail. She knew he would be at Cambridge by now. Perhaps she was on some classified mission. She wouldn't be able to tell him without killing him.

_But what a way to go_, he thought with a grin on his face.

He opened the freezer and took a look at the stacks of plastic dishes inside. He chuckled when he remembered his mother sometimes left little notes in the lunches she packed for him when he was just a boy. He was smart enough to keep those hidden so the other kids didn't tease him about a piece of paper saying 'Mommy loves you" on it, but he found it so hysterical now that same person used to torture, seduce, and even kill for a living. Clearly somewhere along the way…about twenty years ago, in fact…she became what could only be described as the All-American Mom. But despite not knowing the truth about his family until only recently and being put in grave danger because of it, John knew he lucked out when it came to having wonderful parents.

He turned in surprise when he heard a knock on his door. He closed the freezer and went to the door. He checked the image on the small security monitor next to the door and his eyes widened in excitement. He threw the door open.

"Chinese takeaway?" Samantha said, holding a few Chinese takeaway containers in her hands.

John grinned and gave her a kiss. Samantha carefully wrapped her arms around him, trying not to spill any of the food she brought.

"I left you several messages," John said, trying to contain his excitement. He stepped back to let her into the apartment.

"I know, and I'm sorry for not replying. Working at the SIS for the last six weeks has been…"

Samantha let the words trail off, and John saw the look of stress on her face. "Are you OK?"

Samantha nodded with little enthusiasm. "I just needed to get away from London for a while. See a friendly face. And there isn't a face friendlier than yours."

She gave him a kiss. "But I'm also hungry, so let's have some dinner."

"Of course," John replied and gestured towards the living room area. Samantha laid the boxes on a small table while John retrieved two cans of soda from the refrigerator.

"I'm sorry I don't have anything stronger yet. I'm still digging through my boxes to find my passport, and I don't get my university ID until Monday."

"That's fine, John," Samantha said as she took one of the boxes and a pair of chopsticks out of the bag. She sat down on one end of the couch as John sat down on the other end, leaning forward to see what Samantha brought. He settled for some moo shu pork.

"Have you worked in the office since taking the oath?"

Samantha nodded. "Even someone who was fast-tracked like me doesn't go out into the field right away. Mostly I've been looking over old mission profiles, doing analysis, and writing reports."

"Ugh, that does sound boring. I can understand getting tired of that."

"That's not the problem, unfortunately." Samantha took a long exhale. "Obviously you can't say this to anyone, but I needed to get this off of my chest. There's a lot of tension around British Intelligence these days. Two agents were killed recently, and three others haven't been heard from in some time."

John sat back on the couch. "Wow. I'm so sorry."

"Everybody is really on edge, and a lot of rumors have been swirling around. I really don't know who to believe."

"You didn't ask your mother about this? I would think she could give you better answers than I ever could."

Samantha shook her head. "I gave it some thought, but I don't really want her to know about this. Either she'd think I was already having trouble handling the job, or she might freak out about me if I told her what these rumors were."

"What do you mean?"

Samantha paused for a moment and looked at the ground. John guessed she was deciding in her mind if she should tell him what was going on. In a way, the fact she was even contemplating it made him realize just how special he was to her.

Slowly, she looked at John again. "Some of the people around the Agency think they were killed under orders."

John's eyes widened. "No way."

"There's no way to prove it, obviously. It's all hearsay and unsubstantiated claims. But a number of people are afraid someone high up in the command structure might have gone rogue and are ordering the elimination of certain agents."

John sat there for a moment, trying to process what Samantha told him. "What do you think?"

"Honestly, I don't know. I feel frustrated not knowing what to think."

"I don't think you should feel frustrated, though. How is anybody supposed to react to this?" John paused for a moment. "You don't think, that you'll…you know…"

Samantha shook her head with a tired smile. "I'm some rookie agent who hasn't even been on her first mission. I mean, who am I?"

"Someone very, very incredible, based on what I've seen," John said with a smile.

Samantha turned back to him and smiled. "Thanks, John. I'm so sorry to put all of this on your doorstep…"

John moved behind her and gently massaged her shoulders. "Hey, do not even think of being sorry. You were there for me when my parents were kidnapped. I couldn't have gotten through that without you. This is the least I could do for you."

Samantha lay back against John as he continued to massage her shoulders. She gave a sigh of contentment. "Mmm, you are really good at that. I made the right call coming here."

"Well, I've been told women appreciate a guy who can relax them with a good massage."

"Did your dad say that?"

"Uncle Jimmy, actually. He said it was the only reason Aunt Alex has stayed with him all of these years. I assume he was kidding."

"Based on what your mom and mine told me of him, I'm not so sure he is."

John laughed. "Maybe you're right."

Samantha moaned quietly in pleasure. To John, it almost sounded like a purring cat. "I was going to suggest heading down to the pub tonight, but you're doing such a good job with that massage, I might have to skip right to ravaging you."

John smiled. "We could go to the pub if you want. I can always continue this later."

Samantha turned around and put her lips to his. "Mmmm, how about some light ravaging and then we'll go to the pub," she intoned in a smoky, libidinous voice as she pushed John back on the couch and lay on top of him.

_**Redbridge, London, UK  
September 30, 2033  
6:30 PM GMT**_

Mr. Lightman poured over the surveillance footage from the offices of British Intelligence for the day. So far, his plan was one out of two successful conversions. Even better, the tension around the SIS had increased over the past few weeks, and the fingers were pointing. This was what he had hoped the files implanted in the servers would do. He now had a fourth agent willing to help him, although he kept that agent in the dark regarding what Daemon's plans truly were. The other agent they tried to ensnare hesitated with their desires for a change. Unfortunately, he couldn't afford to let that agent have time to think, so they met with a most unfortunate accident. Drivers around London sometimes did not look where they were going.

He caught something on one of the surveillance feeds from thirty minutes ago. A young woman exited the offices of MI-5 and headed to the train station. He froze the image and checked her face against his personnel database. He saw the name Samantha Collins. There wasn't much in her file, but there were certainly plenty of stories floating around about the youngest agent in the Secret Service in over sixty years. He didn't have many details, but he knew it had something to do with an American operation she had somehow become involved in. When she returned, she was put on the fast-track for agent status.

Lightman furrowed his brow. She was heading to a British Rail station rather than the Underground. That itself was unusual, as any agent could simply sign out a car and drive to wherever they wanted.

_Unless she doesn't want her supervisor to know where she was going_, he thought.

He checked the schedules for trains that would leave around the time she went into the station. Mr. Lightman was curious to know where Samantha Collins was going. And whom she was seeing.

She would be a welcome addition to Daemon.


	4. Putting the Pressure On

_Well, it took me six months, but I finally got to the next chapter of this story. I do apologize. As you may or may not know, I had moved back to Chicago from Charlotte and I have been looking for employment ever since. It's been frustrating; I can't lie. I think even the people who were convinced I could find work up here in my hometown are surprised I haven't found any yet. I wish I knew what was going on, but I'm still putting out the resumes and doing whatever I can to find one.  
_

_I had given thought to both restarting this story and abandoning it entirely, sometimes within minutes of each other. But in the end, I decided I needed something to accomplish, something to concentrate on besides finding a job. Of course, given how I approach story-writing as if it's a job and not a fun hobby doesn't really help a lot. But somehow I got this latest chapter in, and I will try to finish the three chapters to follow in a shorter time period than six months.  
_

_In the meantime, enjoy this new chapter, and please leave a review if you can. It'd be a real pick-me-up, whether you think the story is good or not. Thanks!**  
**_

* * *

_**Maypole Public House, Cambridge, UK  
September 30, 2033  
9:30 PM GMT**_

Samantha took in a long breath and exhaled it just as slowly. "Much better."

"I'll bet it feels good to not talk shop. Although I'm guessing we couldn't do that in here anyway."

"That would not be wise."

John laughed and raised his pint of lager to Samantha's, who clinked it with hers. They were far more relaxed than they were when Samantha arrived at John's college apartment. Fortunately, John and Samantha were experts at 'relaxing' each other, so they were in very good spirits when they arrived at the pub. The boisterous atmosphere of students reacquainting themselves with old friends in the pub before the first week of classes and the better-than-average band playing made the evening quite festive.

"So, enough about me. How have you enjoyed our fair country so far?" Samantha asked with that twinkle in her sky blue eyes that always put John in a good mood.

"I love it. It's been amazing so far. The area around campus is beautiful. I've even taken up jogging. Four kilometers yesterday and eight today."

"Really? I never would have guessed you doing that. Living in Los Angeles most of your life, I figured a place like this would be boring to you."

"I was afraid it might be, but I was wrong. This is as relaxed as I've felt in a long time. Besides, I'm not really the party-hard, adventurous type."

Samantha raised an eyebrow. "OK, I'll admit you're not one to get drunk and make an arse of himself. But given what we did when we met last March, not adventurous? I strongly disagree."

John humbly shrugged his shoulders. "Well, I don't jump off of buildings to relax at the end of a long day. That was a…special situation."

"Indeed it was." Samantha slid her chair closer to him. "So, no chance of joining me in the spy world?"

John looked at the ground. It was a question he thought about time and time again. "I don't know. It could be my parents talking, but they worked so hard to make sure I had a normal life, I'm afraid of disappointing them. They said they'd support me no matter what I decided, but I think I just want to live a quiet, normal life. Maybe be an engineer, like my father was."

John gently cupped Samantha's cheek in his hand. "Besides, the world has you to protect it, right?" Samantha laughed gently. "Jen Burton: Spy Girl."

"What?"

"Oops, I let the cat out of the bag. That's a videogame my dad's company is going to release in time for Christmas. Sort of like his other spy game, only a girl gets to be the hero."

Samantha smiled. "Let me guess: the girl looks a lot like your mother."

"Actually, she's a brunette. She bears a striking resemblance to Aunt Ellie." Samantha's eyes widened in surprise. "I thought that was weird, too, but Ellie tested better as a spy in the marketing trials."

"I'm tempted to buy a copy when it comes out," Samantha replied, her smile promoting itself to a full grin.

"I think you'll end up a bit disappointed. I mean, you've done all of that for real," John replied with an equal grin.

"True," Samantha replied as she leaned in closer to John. "So did you. You even got the girl in the end."

"Did I?" John moved closer as well.

"Absolutely," Samantha purred as her lips gently touched his. John's fingers gently caressed her long red hair as their kiss picked up in desire and want.

"Feel like hanging around here?" Samantha breathed heavily.

"Not really," John replied, equally worked up. "I'm not much of a drinker anyway. And I could never take advantage of a woman who didn't have her wits about her, so I better get you out of here before we get too drunk."

"Mmmm, you are always such a gentleman." Her hand slid under the table. "I'll have to fix that."

John gave a slight moan as the two of them got up from their chairs and walked out of the pub into the night air. They headed down the street, and Samantha pulled John into an alley just off of the main road. She pressed him up against the brick wall and attacked his mouth, her tongue flitting like a hummingbird's wings against his. She pressed her body against him and started to unbutton his shirt

"Mmm, I thought you wanted to go back to the apartment," John gasped as he struggled to catch his breath.

"Not going to make it," Samantha panted as she planted kisses along his neck and chest and started to undo his belt. "You're too damn cute and it's been too damn long."

Samantha grabbed the back of John's neck and drew his lips to hers, her tongue dancing inside of his mouth as she slipped her hand inside of his pants. John's eyes widened and looked back and forth to make sure no one was watching. Suddenly, he grabbed Samantha and turned her to the side, using his body to shield her as a projectile whistled past his ear and embedded itself into the brick wall.

"What the…" John stared at the projectile in shock before whipping his head around and catching a shadowy figure running from the alley. He took off after the person who almost hit Samantha, who was right on his heels. He turned a corner and was met by a kick to the face. He staggered forward and fell against the side of a building as he shook the cobwebs free. The assailant readied himself to take off again, but Samantha blocked his only avenue of escape. He took out a long knife and lunged at Samantha, who twirled to the side to avoid the knife then grabbed the man's wrist, smashing it against her knee to make him drop the knife. The man twisted his arm to grab Samantha's wrist, quickly reaching around to wrap his other arm around her neck and put her in a choke hold. He turned to pull her towards the street…and was met by John's fist. He staggered backwards and fell to the ground, releasing Samantha in the process. Something fell out of his jacket as he scrambled to get up. John and Samantha were poised to attack when the sound of gunshots filled the alley. The two ducked down as the man sprinted for the car at the end of the alley where the shots came from. He dove into the back seat, and the car took off.

John and Samantha ran to the street to spot the car but saw nothing. It didn't surprise Samantha, as the area had a maze of short streets that were effective in losing pursuers. But that didn't make it any less frustrating.

"Are you OK?" John asked her.

Samantha turned to him and reached into her pocket for some tissues, carefully wiping the blood from around John's nose. "Are you sure you don't want to be a spy?"

"I'm sure," he replied with a smile.

Samantha shook her head as she went back to retrieve the items their assailant dropped. "It's like keeping a Renoir in the garage," she muttered as she picked up the knife. She went to retrieve the other item that fell out of the man's coat. She stared at it and her face blanched.

"What's wrong?" John asked with rising concern.

Samantha showed him the tranquilizer gun she retrieved. "I have one just like this. They're issued by British Intelligence."

_**Redbridge, London, UK  
September 30, 2033  
11:00 PM GMT**_

Mr. Lightman looked over the notes he took while listening to the report his underling delivered regarding Samantha Collins and her boyfriend. He had already ordered the man to be liquidated, being as careless as he was to not only fail to capture Collins, but losing some valuable evidence in the process.

On the bright side, at least he knew why she went to Cambridge. She had a boyfriend there. It might have been a tired cliché to threaten a spy by going after someone close to them, but the opportunity presented itself so rarely, it was still something to keep in consideration. The fact that this man helped her fend off the attack was also enlightening. But the _pièce de résistance_ was the report that the boyfriend spoke with an American accent. It felt like too much of a coincidence she would be involved in an American operation six months ago and then be dating an American who went to Cambridge. At the very least, Samantha Collins went to the front of the line for his organization.

He jotted down a few items and composed an email to Tyler Cook to poke around the systems at the DNI in Washington, D.C. He had to find out more about Samantha Collins and her time in the States. He then did a little research of his own. Samantha almost certainly wouldn't let this lie, and Mr. Lightman had to hope Samantha's brains were as good as her brawn. If they were, it would be a simple matter of creating the 'innocent victim' in all of this.

_**Mill Road, City Centre, Cambridge, UK  
September 30, 2033  
10:30 PM GMT**_

Samantha lay on the couch in John's apartment, curled up in his arms. They had not said much since returning, apart from grabbing a drink from John's refrigerator. Her mind was racing at a thousand miles per minute, and she didn't doubt John was feeling the same way. The frustration grew at not being able to put the pieces together.

"I think you have to tell your mother about this," John said gently.

"I can't. At least not yet. Besides, what can she do? Now we know for certain it's someone in British Intelligence. They're the only ones who have tranq guns like that."

"But you don't know who it is. It could be like you said before: someone went rogue. I think you should at least tell her what happened. Maybe she can help."

"I don't want to involve anybody else. What if this gets back to your parents? My mother might freak out, but that's nothing compared to what your parents would do."

"They would not freak out," John replied, a bit offended. "This is what they used to do for a living."

Samantha exhaled. "I'm sorry, John. I didn't mean to say that was a bad thing. I love your parents to death. I wanted to help rescue them when Shaw kidnapped them. But that's the thing. They're not spies anymore. They're regular parents who worry about their children. Look at everything they did and made other people do so that you and Emma wouldn't find out they used to work for the U.S. government. They wanted you to have a normal life. That was ruined once and I jeopardized it again tonight by seeing you."

John turned Samantha to face him and took her hands. "You did NOT jeopardize anything," he said with conviction. "You needed someone to talk to tonight, and I'm somebody you trust. That's all there is to it. I'm not worried about what happened to me tonight. I'm more worried about you."

Samantha looked down at the ground and squeezed his hands. "Just please promise me you won't tell them what happened. I have ways I can check on this. Let me work this out without putting you in danger."

"Sam…"

"Please, John! Promise me. I couldn't handle anything bad happening to you as it is. But knowing how much your parents would hurt if anything did…I…I couldn't live with that. Just…please let me work this out myself."

John stared at her for several seconds, but they felt like an eternity to Samantha. She was on the fence about telling John in the first place, and now the attack earlier in the evening was filling her with self-recrimination. She had no idea if she was in love with John, given she had never been in love with anyone in her life. _I probably get that from my mother,_ she thought sourly. But she knew how important John was to her and she didn't want him put further in harm's way.

"OK," John finally said. "I promise I won't tell my parents. But YOU be careful. Do you think I could handle it if anything bad happened to you?"

Samantha nodded and smiled. "I know. Thank you, John," she said quietly as she slid her hands over his face. They shared a gentle but passionate kiss.

Samantha gently ran her fingers through John's hair. "Just to be on the safe side, I'm going to find a place to stay this weekend. It's probably a good idea to stay away from you for a few days."

She reached into her bag and took out a small device. She handed it to John. "Do me a favor, though. Keep this on you at all times."

"What is this?"

"It's a GPS-coded emergency callout. Press the red button, and it will alert me alone to your location. I'll try to call your cell phone, but short of that I'll come find you. Press the blue button, and the callout goes to MI:5. We use it for witnesses and defectors under our protection. That will dispatch law enforcement to wherever you are within minutes."

John nodded. "OK. I will."

Samantha pulled John to his feet and put her arms around him. "I'm going to head back to one of the pubs and call a taxi. With all of the taxis called when the bars close, I can blend in easily. I have to stay out of sight while I try to figure this out. Once I have, I'll come back, OK?"

"I understand," John replied, although his downcast expression made it clear he didn't like it.

Samantha gently caressed his face, her eyes welling a bit at seeing how much this hurt him. She gave him a soft kiss, holding him in her arms.

"I promise to return," she whispered in his ear. "You're a hard person to forget."

John smiled. "Please be careful."

"I will."

Samantha walked slowly towards the door. She took one look back at John, giving him a gentle wave, before exiting his apartment and walking downstairs to disappear off the grid. In this day and age, disappearing off the grid took a lot of effort and ingenuity, given how many surveillance cameras existed and how so many things were done with computers, even trying to find a run-down hotel in which to stay the night. Fortunately, Samantha's mother prepared her for this and set up a series of accounts and aliases not even British Intelligence knew about.

As she sat inside the bar and waited for her taxi, Samantha contemplated what she needed to do next. Trying to investigate the people after her would tip them off, so she needed help. Someone she could trust. She had only one friend inside MI:5 and that person wasn't even an agent yet. Still, Michelle might be able to check a few things for her she couldn't do herself.

Her options were limited. She had to find out who was after her.

_**Tottenham Street, West End, London, UK  
October 3, 2033  
10:00 AM GMT**_

Natasha Herbert took a look around the neighborhood. The overburdened British taxpayer surely would not have loved to hear locally-stationed agents lived in such an expensive area of London, but there was a strategy to it. Agents always lived in the areas where they would either work the most or blend in the best. Older agents and married couples were placed in family-friendly neighborhoods. Agents who could pass for college students typically wore hoodies and sweats all day and lived near UCL. But for high-profile agents like Samantha Collins and her, they were always within a stone's throw of the nightlife.

She found the three-flat and pulled her hat low so the surveillance cameras wouldn't get a picture of her face. She picked it out not only for its practicality, but for the fact it was quite the fashion these days, which would make her even less distinctive to anyone walking by. Tyler Cook had already programmed an access card to get her into Samantha Collins' flat. She walked up the stairs and entered. True to what Mr. Lightman predicted, the flat looked like nobody had been in it for several days.

Herbert walked into the bedroom and found her quarry. Most rookie agents were so afraid to make themselves stand out in their personal lives; they almost always chose a floor safe based on the recommendations of older, more experienced agents. This would be excellent advice…assuming an expert safecracker like Herbert wasn't after something in the safe. Herbert put on a pair of gloves and attached a device to the safe. The locked was picked within seconds, and Herbert opened the safe. She took out Samantha's Agency-issued sidearm and a magazine of ammunition. She placed it in a plastic bag and stuffed it in her purse. She locked the safe and removed the device. She quickly walked out of the apartment, knocking over an umbrella lying propped against the wall. She put the umbrella back and went down the stairs, exiting the building and finding a taxi to take her to Redbridge.

The first half of the hook was set. They now had to wait for Samantha Collins to make her move.

_**Mill Road, City Centre, Cambridge, UK  
October 3, 2033  
6:00 PM GMT**_

Both of his parents…indeed, every last person whom John knew that had attended college…told him the same thing: the first few days could be intimidating, no matter how successful you were in high school.

They were right on target. And worrying about Samantha didn't make things better.

John had barely listened through his first few classes. Although the professors mostly gave out the syllabi for the courses and verified students had the correct texts, John still had a hard time concentrating. Everything that happened over the weekend still weighed on his mind, particularly whether or not Samantha was OK. Even the daily jog he took through the campus couldn't get his mind off of Samantha being in trouble. And not being able to do anything about it frustrated him all the more.

He looked at the reheated parmesan chicken and noodles his mother made for him last week, which he had been pushing around for the last hour. He dropped the fork in the dish in disappointment. He wasn't in much of a mood for dinner. He had to do something, but he wanted to keep his promise not to tell his parents about Samantha's problems.

Suddenly he froze. _I didn't promise I wouldn't tell anybody else_, he suddenly thought.

He briefly chided himself for not thinking of this sooner. After all, they had resources at their disposal, and they would ensure he'd stay out of trouble. And if his parents HAD to be told of this, they could convince them he tried to stay out of it and do what was best.

He got out his iComm and made the call. It was good to have friends in high places. And short of the President himself, Alex Forrest-Slade was as high up as you could get.

_**Ferguson Hall, MI-5 Headquarters, London  
October 3, 2033  
6:00 PM GMT**_

Samantha knocked on the dorm room door. She knew Michelle came home from the gym at about this time just before heading down to the cantina for a quick meal and studying. She felt a bit guilty about asking for her help when the two of them had entered training together and she was already in the field, but she didn't have a lot of options.

Michelle opened the door. "Sam, what are you doing here?"

"Can we talk for a minute?"

Michelle furrowed her brow at the look of worry on Samantha's face. Their last conversation was far more playful, given they were busting each other's chops about where they were headed next.

"Sure. Come in."

Samantha quickly went inside, and Michelle closed the door. "I'm sorry to bother you like this, but I don't really have anyone I can trust with this."

"You're an agent and you don't have anyone you can trust?" Michelle asked with a smirk. "Were you asleep the first day of training?"

"I'm serious, Michelle. I can't even trust anybody in MI:5."

"What's wrong?"

-/^\-

"John, you're putting us in a bad spot."

"I know, Aunt Alex, and I'm sorry. But Samantha wanted to do this without telling her mother or my parents. I'm worried she might be in over her head if she's right."

"You're probably in trouble, too," Jimmy said as Alex and he talked to John. "If they followed her to Cambridge, it won't take them long to figure out she's dating you. I think we have to tell them."

"Please don't. This isn't Sam's fault. How was she to know this would happen? My parents would never forgive her for putting me in danger."

"John, they won't take it out on her. She didn't put you in danger. If there's some organization smart enough to stay hidden inside of British Intelligence, they would have found you eventually. Your parents would understand that."

John exhaled. "Look, all they can do is worry. You two have the resources to do something about this. Can't…can't you two take care of this without involving them? They've been through enough already this year. Please?"

The spy couple looked at each other. John had a point. Had he talked to his parents directly, they would have called Alex and Jimmy anyway. John was just saving a step. Both of them had enough connections to find out what was going on without spooking the bad guys, if they really were working inside the SIS.

"OK, John. We'll look into it discreetly," Alex replied. "In the meantime, don't contact Samantha. Go to classes like you don't know what's going on. If they don't think you know anything, they'll probably stay away for now. Keep an eye out to see if anybody is watching you, and let us know right away if they are."

"I will."

"Remember, don't do ANYTHING," Jimmy repeated. "Let us handle this. And if you're even in the slightest hint of danger, you don't keep it to yourself. Got it?"

"Yes, Uncle Jimmy."

"Bye, John," Alex said and hung up the phone. John was relieved. He wouldn't have been surprised if Alex and Jimmy had told his parents; a small part of him even wished they did. But his parents had done so much for Emma and him to lead a normal life free from the dangers they faced when they were younger, and he didn't want them dragged through it once again. Whatever was going on in British Intelligence, he hoped they could figure it out and stop it so Samantha's life wouldn't be in danger.

He decided not to be a part of that world, but he definitely wanted Samantha to be a part of his.

-/^\-

"I can't believe it. I mean, I heard a few rumors, but…"

Michelle sat there in shock at the information Samantha gave her about being attacked at Cambridge.

"What can I do?" Michelle asked.

"See what you can find out. I can't start poking around here and investigating; whoever this is would find out in an instant. I don't know, maybe ask a few questions here and there or see what you can find on the computers."

"Sam, I'm still a student here."

"Yeah, but weren't you dating that guy in the IT department? See if he'll give you a hand."

"OK, I will."

Samantha gave Michelle a hug. "Thank you. I owe you one."

Samantha quickly left Ferguson Hall so she wouldn't be spotted. However, the building had been under surveillance for several days. And her arrival was expected.

_**Serafino's Restaurant, Mayfair, London  
October 6, 2033  
7:00 PM GMT**_

Michelle looked around nervously. The table Samantha told her to wait at was secluded, just like she said in her text message. She didn't have much to report, although the guy she was dating in the IT department did say he was checking on a couple of unusual activities in the computer systems.

She looked towards the back door of the restaurant, wondering if it was such a good idea to just wait. She turned back, but the only thing she saw was the figure in front of her and the gun aimed at her head. It was the last thing she would ever see.

Natasha Herbert lowered the gun she took from Samantha Collins' apartment. She stood for a moment looking down at the body of Michelle Jarvis as the blood began to pool out from the back of her head. She stepped over the body and walked out the back door, grateful the large crowd at the restaurant meant nobody could have singled her out.

Samantha Collins arrived at Serafino's three minutes later as Michelle's email requested. At least, the email she thought was from Michelle. She made her way to the back of the restaurant where Michelle would be. Her blood felt like it was ice cold, and she began to shake.

"No…" she cried quietly at seeing her friend lying dead in front of her. Tears streamed down her face as she stepped forward gingerly. She then saw the gun on the floor. She grabbed a napkin and picked it up.

Oh, my God, she thought as she saw the registration number of the gun. The same gun MI-5 issued to her last month.

A high-pitched scream and the breaking of plates on the floor made her jump. She turned around to see several patrons and employees staring at her in shock. One of them immediately got on their iComm to call the police. Samantha immediately ran out the back door of the restaurant and disappeared into the crowded Mayfair streets.

After getting at least two kilometers away from the restaurant, she ducked into an alley and slumped against the building. She was losing the battle to keep her emotions in check. Michelle was killed because she asked for her help. And leaving Samantha's gun at the crime scene meant they were trying to frame her for the murder. She didn't know what the hell was going on, but any chance she had of finding out was gone. She was a fugitive.

It was the last thing she wanted to do, but he was her only friend now.

_**Mill Road, City Centre, Cambridge, UK  
October 7, 2033  
1:00 AM GMT**_

The trip from London to Cambridge took only ninety minutes under normal circumstances, but this night was as far from normal as it could be. Samantha used every means at her disposal to get there without being caught, even hitchhiking a ride from an older couple who thought her car had broken down.

She knocked on the door. To her surprise, John answered right away.

"Are you OK?" a relieved John asked.

Samantha stood there wanting to say something, but the words wouldn't come out. She began to shake uncontrollably. John wrapped his arms around her and held her tightly.

"It's OK, Sam. It's OK," John said gently as he held onto her.

"Oh God, John. Michelle's dead. She's dead because of me," Samantha wailed. "Someone murdered her and pinned it on me. My issued sidearm was there."

"I know, Sam. I know."

Suddenly Samantha stopped shaking and looked at him. "How could you possibly know?"

"Do you remember when I promised not to tell my parents anything?" Samantha nodded. "Well, technically, I kept to that promise. However…"

John gently steered Samantha into the apartment and closed the door behind them. They walked into the living room area, and Samantha's mouth dropped open in shock.

Chuck, Sarah, Casey, Gertrude, Alex, and Jimmy were waiting for them.


	5. Outfox the Fox

_Hello. Things have been a bit busy in the last couple of weeks, mostly with interviews and making changes to my resume and online profiles. You wouldn't believe the number of times I had to retake my picture just so I looked semi-human. But hopefully some of these new strategies I'm trying will help me get a job._

_Anyway, I'm bringing you the latest chapter to the story. I have a couple of ideas for stories after this, one being a Forrest & Slade story that will be more comedy than anything else, then I'll have a new Next Generation story. I have to work out a few details on that one, but the plot will be more along the lines of a John McClane-type story. And I mean the first Die Hard, not the one that's getting ripped from stem to stern today._

_And if you like romantic stories (that are very M-rated), I'll have my traditional Valentine's Day story out later today or tonight. A little tease: Sarah races against the clock to do something in it. Let your mind wander on that one. ;-)_

_Enjoy this chapter, and please leave reviews._

* * *

_**Mill Road, City Centre, Cambridge, UK  
October 7, 2033  
1:00 AM GMT**_

Samantha hung on to John as she looked at the people inside of his apartment. The last thing she wanted was for this to spin out of control, but that was academic now. She needed the people in front of her if she was to prove her innocence and stop whoever was doing this.

She then caught the eye of Chuck and Sarah and stepped away from John. She hung her head in shame.

"Mr. and Mrs. Bartowski, I am so sorry. I didn't want to involve John in this…"

"Sam!" John exclaimed. "I told you that wasn't your fault. My parents would never get mad at you. Mom, could you tell her, please?"

"I am mad at her, John," Sarah replied, her eyes locked intently on Samantha.

John turned to her in shock. "I can't believe you. She didn't put me in danger. She was in trouble and she turned to the one friend she has…"

"…but not about that," Sarah continued. John looked at her in silence as Sarah turned her attention back to Samantha. "You're worried there might be a traitor inside of MI-5 and your first instinct was to handle it by yourself? It never occurred to you there are people out there who are willing to help you?"

Samantha continued to look down at the ground in shame. "I…I didn't want to put anyone in danger. I didn't want anybody risking their lives for me."

"So you think that would stop us from worrying about you? Let me tell you right now, it didn't. You risked your life to rescue us when we were kidnapped, so I think we have the right to be upset when you gamble your life like this." Sarah's voice continued to rise. "And you must have a very low opinion of your mother if you really think she wouldn't understand having difficulty being a brand new agent."

"Sarah, come on," Jimmy interjected. "We all had to learn that lesson, even you. Think of how your first year was on the job. Hell, I screwed up twice as bad when I started and I wasn't a nineteen-year-old kid at the time."

Sarah calmed down at that and her stance softened. She stepped forward and wrapped her arms around Samantha. "I'm sorry, Sam," she said gently as Samantha shook in her arms.

"I never wanted to put your son in danger, I swear," Samantha said as she sobbed quietly.

"I know, honey. I know you would never do that. But I worry about you just like I worry about my own children. Your mother and I have been best friends longer than either of us will ever admit. And I can't stand to see you in trouble any more than seeing John or Emma in trouble."

"I'll tell my mother what's going on. I promise."

Sarah gave a tiny smile as she looked at Samantha. "Chuck and I will be there with you. Just no more thinking you can do this alone, OK?" Samantha nodded and Sarah gently guided her to a seat near the equipment Casey and Jimmy had already set up. "Now tell us exactly what happened tonight. Don't leave anything out."

Samantha pulled her gun out of her purse and placed it on the table. "Michelle texted me yesterday and told me she had some information about what was going on from the IT guy she was dating. When I got to the restaurant, I saw her at the table she said she would be at, and she…she was dead. And my gun was lying right next to her."

Casey nodded. "Even without the gun, it won't take the police long to figure out what kind of gun was used based on the ammo. And whoever did this knew that, too."

"Do you still have Michelle's text message on your iComm?" Chuck asked.

"Yes, yes I do," Samantha replied and immediately handed it to Chuck. He hooked it up to a laptop computer he designed at Carmichael Industries that rivaled the best machines in the NSA. He analyzed the information.

"I don't know. The message could have been faked, but if it was, whoever did it is really good at covering her tracks."

"We can probably get the log records from BT and synchronize everything," Alex said. "We'll figure it out."

"Michelle told me to meet her at seven but then said she would be late…" Samantha suddenly put the pieces together. "She never sent that second message. God, how could I be so stupid?"

"Don't beat yourself up," Jimmy replied. "It was a high-risk play on their part. They had to get you there within minutes after they killed Michelle to pin it on you. The coroner can get the time of death to within fifteen minutes, so their window was pretty narrow. I'd also be willing to wager there are no good surveillance shots of the killer."

"What exactly did you tell Michelle to look for?" Casey asked.

"I told her about the disappearance of several agents. A couple of them turned up dead, like that one couple in the pub. But several of them are still unaccounted for. Everybody in the office is on edge right now. There are rumors floating around that the higher-ups ordered them to be eliminated."

"No way," Alex replied sternly. "Chancellor Nolan doesn't operate like that. If he was permitting this to happen, he'd make damn sure everyone knew about it and why. At the very least, he'd call us in to investigate so it could be done objectively. Someone is killing these agents to create discord, just like they are trying to pin Michelle's murder on you."

"But why?"

"That's what we're going to find out. And the best way to do that is to make sure everybody knows you've been caught."

"Wait, you want me to be arrested and charged?"

"Whoever did this didn't set you up because they wanted you out of the way," Gertrude replied. "If some organization inside British Intelligence can do all of this, why would they be worried about one rookie agent? No offense, Sam."

Samantha shrugged. "None taken. Well, I don't think any is."

"They want you for a reason. What that reason is, I don't know, but they could have just as easily killed you if they thought you were a risk. You're more valuable to them alive than dead. But first they need you desperate. They need you in a place where you don't have any choice but to take whatever it is they offer. We're going to play right into that."

"You, your mother, and I are going to visit Chancellor Nolan first thing in the morning," Alex said. "He knows I'm in town but he doesn't know why. We'll take you to him and tell him everything that has happened. If I'm right, he'll agree to our plan."

"We're going to let the Metropolitan Police catch me and make a very public arrest?"

"Exactly. We'll leak evidence that you and Michelle were both seeing the same guy and that you went into a jealous rage when he left you. And you killed your former friend."

Samantha shook her head. "Whoever did this is never going to believe that."

"That's the idea. It's a smokescreen for the public's benefit. But whoever did this will assume British Intelligence and the Met are working together and plan to let you rot in jail. That's when we hope they'll offer you an alternative to a life behind bars."

"But how do we find out who these people are?"

"We're going to play a little high-and-low," Casey replied. Samantha looked at him in confusion. "Chancellor Nolan will order an internal investigation. And to insure objectivity and no chance of influence, he'll ask the head of the DNI to lead the investigation. Who will, in turn, send one of her best agents to London."

Samantha looked at Alex and Jimmy and smiled, suddenly catching on to the plan. "So while Jimmy plays the 'high' and investigates in plain sight…"

"…Gertrude, Chuck, and I will go in and turn over every rock looking for the people behind this and nobody will ever know. Hopefully, Slade making a lot of noise will send these bastards in our direction."

"If you need someone to talk to, you should start with the IT guy Michelle was dating. He might know something."

Casey nodded. "That's Chuck's first stop. Also, we have to keep that person protected. If he does know something, he could be in danger. At the very least, he might be considered a loose end too risky to not take care of."

Samantha exhaled. "Oh, God. I didn't even think about him being in danger."

"Not to worry," Chuck replied. "That's why we brought these." He held up an IntComm. "Jimmy and I each have one. And if there's anything in the computers at MI-5 the bad guys left in there, we'll find it."

Samantha exhaled in relief, although it still astonished her how easy everybody made solving her problem sound. But she had seen them in action before, so what would be impossible to some was child's play in their hands.

"Thank you," she said quietly. "You're right; I should have come to all of you when I found out this happened. I made a mistake."

"We rented a couple of apartments across the street," Casey said to conclude the evening. "We'll reconvene in the morning."

Casey, Gertrude, Jimmy, and Alex packed the equipment and exited John's apartment. John closed the door and turned to his parents. "What can I do to help?"

Chuck shook his head. "Not a thing. You're going to attend your classes like normal."

"What? How can I concentrate on school with all of this going on?"

"John, I know you want to help, but this situation is too dangerous," Sarah gently replied. "And remember, you chose to go to college. You didn't want to become a spy. And that's what we want you to do."

"But…"

"They're right," Samantha added. "Besides, if you keep attending classes, the bad guys might think I didn't try to get help before being arrested. As long as they don't think you're involved, they should leave you alone."

She took John's hand. "Please? Just do me this one favor?"

John looked at her for a long moment. His parents had told him a few times of how frustrating their jobs as government agents could get, such as when Casey went rogue or when Carina improvised an idea they weren't expecting or Jimmy pulled some crazy stunt that almost killed him. But patience was something both of them tried to teach John in his life, especially when he was going through baseball tryouts as a child or wanted to ride Space Mountain despite not being tall enough.

John nodded gently. "OK."

Chuck gave his son a hug. "If you see anything out of the ordinary on campus, call us right away," Chuck told his son. "No matter how innocent it might look."

"I will, Dad."

Sarah also gave John a hug. "Be careful. Love you, sweetie."

"Love you, too, Mom."

Chuck and Sarah exited the apartment, leaving only John and Samantha there.

"I am so sorry about Michelle," John said quietly.

Samantha looked at the ground as her eyes welled up. John held onto to her as the events of the evening gave way to the reality of losing her friend. She cried softly as John kept a tight grip on her.

"It's OK, Sam," John whispered gently into her ear. Samantha may have been right that it would be safer to pretend he knew nothing, but damned if he wasn't going to comfort a friend who needed it.

After a few moments, her tears subsided. She looked up at John, who tenderly wiped a few tears away from her cheek.

"Remember when I told you not to call your parents and let me handle this on my own?" Samantha asked.

"Of course."

Samantha slid her hands to either side of John's face and pulled him to her for a kiss. It was a kiss she felt in her soul. "Thank you for not listening to me."

"You're welcome," John said with a smile that calmed any last apprehension Samantha still had in her. She stroked his cheek again with her hand before slowly turning away and exiting the apartment.

_**Regent Street, West End, London, UK  
October 7, 2033  
7:15 AM GMT**_

Alex's chauffeured car pulled up to the residence of Chancellor Timothy Nolan, head of the Secret Intelligence Service. It was far from the first time Alex had been at his residence, given she communicated with C, as the Director General was known, on a weekly basis. Jimmy and she had C and his wife, Delia, to their house in Chevy Chase several times for parties. While the boys would wile away the evening shooting some pool in the game room, Delia and Alex would talk about their families and how insufferable their husbands could be, Delia wishing her husband would loosen up and Alex hoping Jimmy would be less playful.

The valet was standing by at the door as Alex exited the car with Chuck, Sarah, and Samantha. He gestured for all of them to enter the residence, taking their coats in the process. C walked down the stairwell to greet them in the main hallway.

"Alex, good to see you as always," C said as he shook her hand. He then turned to Chuck and Sarah. "And I am honored to have a pair of legends in my home." He shook both of their hands. "Many of your exploits are still required reading."

Finally, he turned to Samantha. "Agent Collins, I am very sorry for your loss. I know Michelle was a close friend of yours. It was a senseless crime that will not go unpunished."

"Then you know I had nothing to do with her murder?" Samantha asked.

C gave a slight smile. "If you were that sloppy in killing your best friend, you never would have been promoted in the first place. I've been studying all of the data the Metropolitan Police have been forwarding me since last night. Unfortunately, there's no surveillance video on the actual murder. A few glitches in the cameras around the restaurant happened right around the same time. Of course, they are only glitches if you believe in coincidence."

C gestured towards a door just off of the main hallway. Inside, a conference table wa set up with a laptop similar to Chuck's projecting an image on a screen on the far wall. Everybody took seats at the table, choosing not to grab a pastry or coffee lying on a second table against the wall.

"Someone on the inside erased them?" Chuck asked.

"They had a two-hour window to get into the system and erase the incriminating evidence. It would not be difficult."

"So the Met has only eyewitness testimony and ballistics to go on, correct?" Alex asked.

C nodded. "They already know the caliber of the gun is one issued by the SIS, so the Inspector at the crime scene made the right decision in calling the Commissioner last night, who in turn called me."

"Have you had any luck trying to find who has been hacking your systems?" Chuck asked.

"Not so far."

"Michelle told me one of the IT people might have found something in one of the systems, but she didn't tell me anything specific," Samantha replied.

"We want Chuck to talk to him and perhaps the two can find out more," Sarah added. "With your permission of course, Chancellor."

C nodded and smiled at Chuck. "I am well aware of Mr. Bartowski's qualifications. My IT people are at your disposal. Now what shall we do with Agent Collins?"

"We want the police to arrest her," Alex replied. "Once word leaks through the SIS that one of their agents was arrested for murder, you'll call for a top-to-bottom investigation and will bring in an outside agent to conduct it to insure objectivity."

"I take it you have someone in mind?" C then nodded in recognition of Alex's plan. "You want your husband to conduct a very public and very loud investigation."

"Hopefully, that will send people running in the other direction, where John Casey and Gertrude Verbanski will keep a sharp eye out. If someone tries to hide something from Jimmy, they'll find it."

C sat back for a moment and mulled over Alex's plan. He then rose from his seat. "Let's get started. I'll call the Commissioner and inform him of their part. Meanwhile, get your people ready. By the afternoon, the rumors about Agent Collins' arrest should pick up around the SIS. Then I'll be ready to announce the investigation."

Everyone rose from their chairs, grateful Chancellor Nolan agreed to their plans. They headed out of his residence to get organized.

_**MI-5 Headquarters, London  
October 10, 2033  
12:55 PM GMT**_

Chuck knocked on the door to the IT department and a very timid man came to answer it. Judging by the combination of fear and heartbreak on his face, Chuck figured this to be the person Michelle was dating.

"Gerald Cooper?" Chuck asked him, to which he nodded quietly. "I'm Chuck Bartowski. I think your supervisor told me I'd be by to ask you about Michelle."

"Yes, of course. Please come in."

Chuck walked into a small office with a server set up in one corner, which was connected to the main servers one floor below.

"I'm very sorry to hear about Michelle. I understand you had been seeing her."

Gerald sat at his chair and wrapped his arms around himself. "Yes, I was. I mean, we had only been going out for a couple of weeks, but I thought it could have been something. I still can't believe she's gone. I heard Samantha was arrested for her murder. I can't believe that. Those two were such close friends…"

Chuck put his hand up. "She didn't. That's why I'm here. Her arrest was for the public's benefit so they'd forget about the incident. But I need your help to find out who really did this. Michelle asked you to look for something a few days ago, is that correct?"

"She wanted me to comb through the computer systems to find anything unusual within the last few weeks. Memos, emails, anything out of the ordinary. I told her I found something weird with the backup logs."

"Like what?"

"Well, I don't know what it means, but I checked some of the computer logs over the last few weeks vs. the nightly backups. The computers would normally flag anything unusual, but if the timestamp on the logs is less than a minute off, it doesn't bother with it, thinking it's a processing delay."

"But you went in and checked the backups and found some discrepancies?"

Gerald nodded. "It's the sort of thing you wouldn't find unless you were looking for it, but a series of timestamps came up that weren't right. All of them were between 50 and 55 seconds off from the same marks in the backup files, and all of them occurred the day of or the day after another agent had supposedly disappeared."

Chuck sat back in his chair. "Well, it may not be enough to find these people, but it's a good starting point. Can you show me what you found?"

"Certainly. But I don't know how much it will help."

"This is just one part of the plan. The next part will be starting any minute."

"You mean, the Director's talk?"

Chuck nodded and smiled. "You won't have to attend. We can keep working. I'll fill you in on the highlights."

-/^\-

Monitors throughout MI-5 Headquarters froze and their image was replaced with Chancellor Nolan's image. A group of one hundred people who did not have their own desks in the facility gathered in the main theatre to catch his talk in person.

"Ladies and gentlemen, thank you for taking a few minutes out of your busy schedules. I need to address some of the events that have happened over the last few weeks. I am sure you have heard by now of the murder of one of our agents-in-training, Michelle Travis, and the arrest of one of our agents, Samantha Collins, for her murder. This is what the public believes. However, a preliminary investigation into this leads me to suspect Miss Travis' murder may be much more complicated than that. Over the last several weeks, we have lost three field agents, and four others are not accounted for. Up to this point, we have relied on the Metropolitan Police to investigate, but rumors began to circulate through this building that someone in the SIS was involved. It is possible Agent Collins is the perpetrator, but I have concluded a top-to-bottom internal investigation of the events of the last several weeks are in order. And to insure impartiality and objectivity, I have asked my counterpart, Alex Forrest, Director of National Intelligence for the United States, to appoint someone to conduct the investigation. At this time, I wish to turn this meeting over to him. Ladies and gentlemen, allow me to introduce you to former CIA Special Agent Roger Murdock."

C stepped aside as Jimmy walked up to the microphone, holding back a smile as the Chancellor remembered to use the name the world knew him as. "I've spent over twenty years as an agent, and the second assignment with which I was tasked involved the very organization I'm addressing today. The men and women of the SIS have been as magnanimous and as helpful to me as the people I've come to know at Langley. So you can certainly understand my distress to find out someone in this organization would betray their own brothers and sisters for some selfish gain.

"Let me assure all of you right now, those responsible for these betrayals will be found. I will talk to every last employee, every last contact, and informant. I will investigate the cleaning crew if I have to. Every last piece of paper, recording, and computer file will be scrutinized for any last bit of information I can find. I will not stop until I find out who is responsible for this. And I will expect and demand your full cooperation because I know that you share my disdain and anger for anyone who would destroy all that you have helped to build in this organization.

"To the people who are responsible, do yourself a favor. Come forward now and admit your wrongdoings. Save yourself the humiliation of inevitable failure. Because most of you know my reputation as an agent; I always got the job done and nobody ever stopped me. And you won't stop me from finding you and bringing you to justice. This is not a threat, because I don't make threats. I make statements of fact. And the fact is, you will be caught."

Jimmy stepped away from the microphone and the meeting was concluded.

-/^\-

John Casey and Gertrude Verbanski attached the leads to the last of their monitors. If there was a surveillance camera in London, they could watch it. Their setup reminded Casey of the old Intersect room where his path was forever altered to this reality. It was a roller coaster ride he would never forget if he lived a hundred lifetimes, and it introduced him to some of the smartest, wildest, craziest, and yet most loyal people he ever knew in his life. He never considered the early years of his life to be all that fortunate, having lost his father at a young age and having to give up a fiancée to serve his country. But meeting these people made up for that a hundred fold. Fortune had definitely shone upon him in the last twenty-five years.

Gertrude booted the system, and the monitors came to life. Casey started the computer to run the facial recognition software and to run the program Chuck and Jimmy programmed for him to sense and record unusual movements on any of the monitors both inside of MI-5 Headquarters and around London. Although the system wasn't perfect, it was an effective alternative to staring at over 200 monitors all day long.

Gertrude went to the coffee maker Casey was smart enough to purchase over the weekend and poured two cups of coffee. She handed one to John, who tipped it to her in appreciation.

"To finding the bad guys," Gertrude said with a tired smile.

"And dispensing some justice," Casey replied. "Some very long, hard, and painful justice."

_**Redbridge, London, UK  
October 10, 2033  
9:30 PM GMT**_

Mr. Lightman looked across the table at Tyler Cook. The news Tyler gave to him wasn't what he wanted to hear.

"If I were to guess, I would say Cooper is trying to look for the files I implanted."

"How long before he could find them?"

Tyler shrugged. "I covered my tracks pretty well. It would have to be a shot in the dark for him to find them. However, someone visited him early this morning, and they spent most of the time during the Chancellor's talk in the computer systems doing some research."

Mr. Lightman nodded. "Did you recognize the other person?"

"No, and his name wasn't registered on any visitor sign-in logs."

"Interesting," Lightman replied quietly. He knew Samantha Collins sat in a Metro jail at the moment, so it's quite possible there was no link between her and the person looking for the files. Lightman knew that Gerald Cooper had seen Michelle Travis a few times, so revenge could have been on the young man's mind. Still…

"Tyler, find out everything you can on anyone Samantha Collins has been associated with. Particularly any links to Alex Forrest or Roger Murdock. Let's not assume them coming over here to investigate is simply coincidence. And find out all you can about her friend at Cambridge, just in case we need to use him as leverage.

"In the meantime, we knew this would have to happen; we'll just move the timetable up a day or two. Mr. Pollard, can you get your hands on an EMP grenade?"

"Not a problem," Arthur Pollard replied. If it took him more than two phone calls to get his hands on a crate of EMP grenades, then he was slipping in his old age. They were the perfect device to use to short out and detonate electronic equipment because they left few traces of their existence.

Get them and then coordinate with Tyler on setting them off. Make sure the fire doors are disabled. Mr. Cooper and his friend will be the victims of a tragic accident."


	6. Best Laid Plans

_Hello. I had a little bit of trouble writing this chapter because I was trying to shore everything up properly to move into the next chapter. Not to worry if some of your favorite characters weren't in the chapter; they'll be there in the finale, to be certain._

_Other than that, still looking for a job, yes. It's frustrating, but you just have to keep plugging away. Hopefully something will come through._

_Once this story is done, I'll start organizing my next Forrest & Slade story. It features a few characters that you may not see often in the fanfic realm, but I thought it would make for a funny story. Then I'll have a new NextGen story following that._

_Enjoy, and please leave reviews!_

* * *

_**New Scotland Yard, Victoria, London  
**__**October 11, 2033  
8:00 AM GMT**_

Carina Miller signed the registry at the front desk and was escorted to the fourteenth floor, where her daughter was being held. The late-night visit she received a few days ago from her daughter, accompanied by Chuck and Sarah, was a shock to the system. She was horrified to learn Samantha lost her best friend and was framed for the crime. She was also upset Samantha tried to keep it from her, but she quickly forgave her daughter. She couldn't get mad at her for acting exactly like she did at her age. Some lessons are easy to learn; others weren't. Samantha managed to avoid the amount of drinking, partying, and sleeping around she did at her age, but that stubborn lone-wolf streak was a different story.

Samantha walked down the hallway in a gray jumpsuit, escorted by two police officers. Carina closed the distance between them in a hurry.

"Sweetie," Carina cried out, hugging her daughter tightly. The two police officers immediately pried off of Samantha. "Sorry," Carina replied to the officers, who pointed to a table the two could sit at.

"Could you give us some privacy, please?" Samantha asked the officers, who retreated a few feet away, the maximum distance they were permitted.

Carina grabbed her daughter's hands across the table. "How are you doing? I am so worried about you!"

Samantha gave her a weird look. "Mom, worst acting job…ever," she said quietly.

"Well, now that I have this turned on, I can stop acting like the typical mother."

Samantha felt the object in her mother's hand. "What is this?"

"This will overlay a different conversation onto the surveillance cameras. Chuck gave it to me. He figures the hacker who is in on this will keep an eye on you by looking at the surveillance here. As far as the surveillance knows, I'm just a mother who's freaking out."

"Tell Chuck I said thanks," Samantha replied with a smile. "How are the rest of them doing?"

"That's the other reason why I'm here. The plan is working. Jimmy has everybody running scared at MI-5. Casey and Gertrude are keeping their eyes open for anything. We hope that'll speed up the process. Someone may even try to contact you today."

"You really think so?"

"Chuck is working with Gerald to find out what's going on. He should be in the SIS as we speak. We hope that puts the pressure on, and whoever did this contacts you and we find out what's going on. You have to make sure whatever they say ends up on the surveillance."

"But wouldn't they be smart enough to do what you just did? Bring something in to fool the recording?"

Carina smiled. "Fortunately, Chuckie's a lot more devious than he was the first time I met him all those years ago. The device I just gave you can also locate and block the signal from any device someone brings in. It will broadcast a wavelength that matches the surveillance system and boost the signal to override anything that can be brought in. Best of all, they'll never know. They'll think they got away with it."

Samantha grinned. "I never realized all of you rubbed off on him like that."

Carina shrugged her shoulders. "To be honest, I think he rubbed off on all of us more. Sarah was as wild as I used to be when she started as an agent. Worse than me, in fact. But Chuck got to her. Chuck got to all of us, really. Casey, Forrest, Jimmy, me…" Carina paused and looked at her daughter for a moment. "Just like a certain offspring of his got to you."

"Oh, come on, Mom. He's just a friend."

Carina shook her head and laughed. "Uh-uh. Don't bother, hon. It's written all over your face. You really like him. And what's wrong with that?"

"Mom, I…" Samantha was silent for a moment, the grin from earlier long gone. "I can't do that to him. He decided to go to college. He doesn't want to be part of this life."

"What, you think Sarah found Chuck through some dating service? He didn't want to be a spy, either, Sam. But life never goes the way you want it to go. You think Casey wanted to spend his life babysitting Chuck? Wouldn't Alex have loved for 9/11 to have never happened or Jimmy to not be a government experiment gone wrong? But those things happen. Fate works however it wants to and that can't be stopped. But if you're lucky, sometimes you get dealt a good hand. And when you do, you have to play it with every last bit of heart and energy you have inside of you."

Carina put her hand on Samantha's arm. "Love isn't easy. It never was and it never will be. Especially for any of us. But all of us made it work. And if you and John feel that strongly about each other, you can make it work, too."

One of the officers gently cleared her throat and pointed at the clock when Carina and Samantha looked in her direction. They nodded in agreement and stood up.

"Let me know if you need anything," Carina said, holding her daughter's hands. "We'll do everything we can to help you."

"I love you, Mom," Samantha replied. Even though she played it up for the surveillance, the sentiment was nonetheless still there.

Samantha was taken back to her cell as Carina was led through the security doors to the elevators.

_**MI-5 Headquarters, London**__**  
**__**October 11, 2033  
10:15 AM GMT**_

Jimmy watched as Tyler Cook entered the small office he used to conduct his interrogations of SIS staff. Right away, he knew something was up. The prior thirty people he interviewed came into the interrogation one of two ways: nervous as hell about their own job or mad as hell they were even being interrogated. But something felt off with the way Tyler walked in. Given what Chuck found with Gerald Cooper late yesterday evening, Jimmy's focus shifted towards the IT people, and Tyler was one of the people who could have altered the files.

"Mr. Cook?"

"Yes, Mr. Murdock. I was told to see you at this time?"

"Please have a seat. I've already had a look through your personnel file. And honestly, I think you can be a lot more useful doing something besides answering a lot of my questions."

"How's that?"

Jimmy projected his IntComm on the far wall. "I was doing some research into the computer systems last night, and I found a few discrepancies here and there. I've noticed the backup logs not in sync with the timestamps from the computers."

Tyler studied the two sets of logs. "These aren't that unusual, Mr. Murdock. Sometimes there are processing delays because the backups run on a different system. If the lag was of any significance, the computer would alert us."

"Could be, but I'm playing a hunch. My theory is the people who did this used these time lags to slip directives into the computer systems to make it look like these murders were committed under orders from the administration. What I need you do to do is pull the logs for the mainframe systems and the backup computers for the last twelve weeks. I'm going to go over these with a fine-toothed comb. If somebody hid something in there, you can be damn sure I'll find it."

"Um, sure. Not a problem."

"Can you have it to me by the end of the day?"

"It'll be tight, but I'll get it done for you, Mr. Murdock."

"Excellent. Don't let me waste any more of your time. Thank you for coming in."

Tyler stood and left the office. Once he was safely gone, Jimmy switched his IntComm to make a call.

"Case, were you able to get the internal camera feeds from MI-5? Excellent. I'm forwarding you a file on a Tyler Cook. He works with the IT group. You and Gertrude keep an eye on him. Chuck told me only three people's work schedules coincided with the discrepancies Gerald found and he was one of them. I'll monitor the computers from here, and the Chancellor already authorized me to receive all mobile phone records from BT. At least now I only have one person to track down."

Jimmy disconnected from Casey. He exited the office and looked for Chuck.

_**New Scotland Yard, Victoria, London  
**__**October 11, 2033  
11:00 AM GMT**_

Samantha was once again led from her cell to the common area just outside of the cells. She was told her barrister and his assistant had arrived to discuss her defense strategy. She was a bit surprised this was happening so quickly, but clearly Casey's plan was having the intended effect. She knew the next few minutes were crucial to the team's success. She had to convince whomever was coming to see her that she wanted to join their team and was willing prove her worth.

Unlike the meeting with her mother this morning, she was led to a small room with a table and four chairs surrounding it. Although no cameras were visible, as these rooms were supposed to grant attorney-client privilege, she was certain every word said in the room would be recorded. Hopefully, whoever was coming to see her would assume that, too.

"Miss Collins?" the older gentleman said as he walked up to her, holding out his hand, which she shook while trying to keep herself from shaking. "I am Bradley Whitaker, your legal counsel. This is my assistant, Kara Milvoy."

"Hello," Samantha replied quietly to the young woman. She tried not to stare at her, but something in the back of Samantha's mind started to wonder about this person.

The three went into the room and closed the door behind them. Bradley immediately opened his briefcase and flipped a switch on a small box inside of it.

"Good," Arthur Pollard said as he took a seat next to Natasha Herbert. "Now we can talk in peace without the Met listening in on us."

"What do you mean?" Samantha asked as she shook her arm gently underneath the table, and the device her mother gave her earlier this morning fell into her hand. She activated it and slipped it into the waistband of her jumpsuit.

"You were targeted, Miss Collins. The government has betrayed you."

"What?"

Natasha passed her a folder. "We don't know his plan, but we do know Chancellor Nolan authorized the hits on those three agents, and four others have disappeared. Either they're dead or they're working for him."

Samantha flipped through the photos and documents in the folder. There were pictures of Tony Furlan, Grace Sullivan, and Carolyn Hurley. There were memos directed at the agents unaccounted for to eliminate them.

"My God," Samantha said quietly.

"We believe those agents, like you, were aware of something going on and were making inquiries, just like you. In this case, Nolan probably figured murdering your friend and framing you killed two birds with one stone."

"That son of a bitch," Samantha growled as she played along. "I'll kill that bastard."

Pollard and Herbert exchanged a quick glance. _Got her_, they thought at the same time.

"There's not a lot you can do from in here, though," Pollard pointed out to her. "We have to get you out of here before they send you off to some remote facility to rot away for the rest of your life."

"I can break out of here, but I need help to escape completely," Samantha said with a considerable amount of enthusiasm.

"You can?"

"What, you don't think I reached the same conclusion?" Samantha gave each of them a hard stare. "I start investigating what's going on, and my best friend ends up dead with all of the evidence pointing to me? Who else could have set all of that up so perfectly?"

"Do you have a plan?"

Samantha nodded. "One of the officers on the second shift has taken a bit of a fancy to me. I guess they don't get a lot of young, attractive prisoners here. I just invite him into my cell, kill him, and take his access card. Down the hall from my cell is the junction box for the surveillance feeds. I short it out, and I'll be able to escape."

"How do we fit in?" Natasha asked.

"Once the box is disabled, it'll take two minutes for them to reroute the power and reboot the system. The lift is 30 seconds from the junction box if I run in a full sprint, and it takes thirty seconds for the lift to reach the lobby. That means I have only sixty seconds to get away from the building before the cameras come back on. I need your help to do that."

Arthur and Natasha looked at each other and nodded. "What time should we be there?"

Samantha did some calculations in her head. "The second shift starts at 4 PM. He usually comes by my cell at 4:15. Give about a minute or two to get him…comfortable, then kill him, take his card…I'll short the box at 4:19 PM. Pull up Loading Dock #4 at exactly 4:20 PM. Don't pull up any earlier, or you'll risk being seen on the cameras."

Arthur looked up at the clock. "Are all of the clocks in the facility synchronized?" Samantha nodded, and Arthur fixed his watch to match. "OK, 4:20 exactly. Do not disappoint us, Miss Collins. We have big plans for you."

"I promise, I'll be well worth your efforts," Samantha replied with a smile.

"Until tonight, then." Arthur Pollard and Natasha Herbert rose from their seats and exited the small room. A guard came by to collect Samantha.

"How did it go?" he asked.

"I need to break out of here tonight. Is Liam on-duty on the night shift?"

"I'll find out for you. What do you want me to tell him?"

"Have him come by my cell at 4:15. And tell him to be ready to put on a good performance."

"I'll let the warden know."

"Thanks, Gareth."

Samantha returned to her cell. She had to admit even one night here was one night too many for her tastes.

_**Page Street, Lambeth, London, UK  
October 11, 2033  
11:00 AM GMT**_

Tyler Cook made sure he was a good distance away from the Thames House before connecting with Mr. Lightman.

"What is it?" Mr. Lightman answered with considerable irritation.

"Mr. Murdock called me into his office a little while ago. He wants me to produce the logs from all the computer systems."

"Do you think he's onto something?"

"I don't know. It would take him days to go through all of that data."

"Unless he already knows what to look for. Were you able to find a link between Murdock and Samantha Collins?"

"Not directly. But I talked to a friend in the CIA. Collins' boyfriend has been there. Apparently he figured into some very important mission about six months ago, and she thinks Murdock knows him. I don't know. It could still be coincidence."

"We can't take that chance. I'll tell Pollard to head your way after he's done with Collins. Set up the EMP grenade in the computer room. I'll send some people to take care of Murdock. But perhaps we should get ourselves a little insurance."

"What do you mean?"

"Nothing you need to worry about. Just make sure Cooper and his friend don't walk out of that computer room."

Tyler heard the beep from the Daemon-issed iComm as Mr. Lightman disconnected. He took a deep breath. He was beginning to wonder if this was worth it.

_**MI-5 Headquarters, London  
October 11, 2033  
12:30 PM GMT**_

Chuck sat back in his chair and craned his neck. Going through the information on all of the computers was becoming quite frustrating. He didn't have to worry about such things at Carmichael Industries anymore; he had a team of programmers even smarter than him to take care of that. He only ever had to look at the final code before sending new software to the alpha testers. Trying to find the implanted files felt more like when he was working on electrical engineering projects back at Stanford: difficult, frustrating, and there was never enough coffee around.

"I'm sorry, Mr. Bartowski," Gerald said with a tired sigh. "I thought I was onto something."

"Don't worry about it. I know how frustrating this can be. Besides, it hasn't been that long since the big investigation started. If we don't find something, my friends will."

Chuck's gComm rang. He saw Casey's gruff visage on the caller ID. "Maybe Casey has something for us." He connected with Casey. "What's going on?"

"Might have a viable lead for you. Tyler Cook."

"Tyler Cook?" Chuck quickly turned to Cooper. "Do you know anything about him?"

Gerald shrugged his shoulders. "Typically he works the late shift out at Cheltenham. He's here this week, though. That's all I know."

"He's a communications officer at GCHQ, Case."

"Yeah, moron, I already know that. Slade forwarded his file to us and told him to keep an eye on him. He met with Cook this morning and told him to get all of the data you two found on the computers. He went off and made a phone call instead."

"What did he say on the phone?"

"I thought I'd save that for your birthday. It was a scrambled phone. How the hell were we supposed to listen in?"

Chuck quietly growled. "Casey, we've known each other for over two decades. Do you think just once we could converse without you being antagonistic?"

"Verbanski is having BT pull up the phone recordings, but that will take time. Keep an eye out for him."

"Wait, there he is," Gerald interrupted. Chuck looked outside the office to see Tyler walking through the computer center, occasionally giving a furtive glance towards him.

"Casey, he's here right now."

"He is? Keep an eye on him, Bartowski."

"We will…what is going on?"

"What?"

"He just ran out of here in a hurry."

Casey's eyes widened. "Get out of there, Chuck! Get out now!"

Chuck looked at his phone in horror for the briefest of seconds before bolting out of his chair. "We have to go!" he shouted to Gerald. They ran for the door, but the locks were engaged.

"What the?" Gerald said in confusion as he tried to use his keycard to open the locks to no avail. "He locked us in!"

Chuck grabbed Gerald and the two ran for the receptionist's desk. They hid under it as the EMP grenade went off. They were stunned briefly by the shockwave. Suddenly the lights went out and the computers and servers began to spark and smoke. The room became engulfed in flames.

They crawled across the floor to a smaller door with a manual release lever. Chuck tried to open it.

"He broke the door. We're trapped!" Gerald exclaimed in wide-eyed terror. The fire suppression system will pump CO2 into here and we'll suffocate!"

Chuck looked around quickly. "Wait a minute." He ran back to the computer they were working at and quickly opened his briefcase. He took out the IntComm and booted it up while he put on the glasses.

"What is that?" Gerald asked.

"Hopefully out ticket out."

Gerald stared at the IntComm unit as it accepted Chuck's identity. "Why is it still working? Shouldn't the EMP have disabled it?"

"We designed it to resist an electromagnetic pulse. Never thought that stupid _Broken Arrow_ movie would ever come in handy. Seriously, lame plot PLUS John Travolta and Christian Slater? Who's idea was that?"

Chuck quickly looked around the room as Gerald grabbed several tissues out of a box to cover his nose and mouth. Chuck looked up at the ceiling, and the IntComm downloaded a schematic of the building along with a few special skills into his mind.

He grabbed Gerald. "Stay low," Chuck ordered him as they moved quickly. They got to the center of the room as the CO2 tanks activated to put out the fire. Chuck jumped onto a chair, grabbed the supports to the air vent, and catapulted himself into the tiny crawl space. He reached his arm down as far as he could, and Gerald leaped up to grab it. Chuck pulled him into the crawl space, and the two began to make their way across the ceiling. They crawled one hundred meters, making several turns through the duct work, until they found a vent that opened up into the outer stairwell. They dropped through the vent onto the stairwell and quickly exited the building.

"Cheers, man," Gerald said as they caught their breath outside. "You have a lot of talent."

Chuck gave a humble shrug. "So I've been told. But I hang out with some very talented people."

"I have to confess something, though."

"What's that?"

"I kind of liked _Broken Arrow_. They show it on the Turner Classic Movies channel all the time."

Chuck gave him a weird look. "You liked it?"

"Well, it was better than that old movie where the cop rescues those hostages in a high-rise while he's barefoot and only wearing an undershirt. Why anybody considers that a classic I'll never know."

Chuck rolled his eyes. "You have no idea how lucky you are you didn't say that five minutes ago."

_**Shepherd's Restaurant, Lambeth, London, UK  
**__**October 11, 2033  
1:00 PM GMT**_

Jimmy Slade enjoyed the brisk walk outside of Thames House as he took a break from his investigating to get something to eat. In all fairness, Casey, Gertrude, and Chuck were the ones who were doing the real investigating right now. He was just around to scare the bad guys into making a mistake. It had only been just over a day since his fire-and-brimstone speech to the SIS about finding who was behind this conspiracy, so he wasn't expecting something to happen all that quickly. Still, it would have been nice to find out what was going on and help Samantha out of her situation.

He stood at the corner of the intersection and waited for the light to turn green. He looked around at the throngs of people quickly walking towards the restaurants for lunch or heading back to their offices. In a weird way, it reminded him of his days working as a computer trainer over twenty years ago. He had taught a lot of those classes at client sites in the downtown areas of Atlanta, Pittsburgh, Detroit, Denver, and a few dozen other cities it would take too long to remember. He always took a walk during the noon break to clear his head, having done painstaking research to find the best bargains in meals in each town. With all of the travel he did, each town began to look the same to him. But now, having had some distance from that, he was having a sentimental flashback that brought a tiny smile to his face.

In fact, he was so lost in thought, he never saw the car that ran through the stoplight and was heading straight towards him.

He was broken out of his thoughts by the sound of a horn and some assorted screams from pedestrians nearby. He then felt himself hit the ground as he was tackled from behind, the car missing him by only a foot.

He looked up to see Alex on top of him.

"OK, uh, you definitely get to pick where we're having lunch," he said in relief and appreciation to Alex.

"You're lucky," Alex replied with a bit of anger towards him. "Why don't you pay attention to your surroundings!? Just because you're not a spy anymore doesn't mean it won't hurt me if you're killed in an accident!"

Jimmy looked up to see the car that almost ran over him spin around. "I…don't think this was an accident."

Alex took a look as well as the car headed towards them once again. Both of them got up and quickly ran down the street as the car bounded around the corner. They pulled out their guns and fired away at the vehicle. The tires of the vehicle were shot out as another vehicle pulled up as well. They ducked down as shots came from that vehicle. Alex rolled out from behind a dumpster to fire at the second vehicle. She disabled it with her last bullets as Jimmy emptied his clip into the first vehicle. The two of them then took off down the alley way as six men exited the vehicles and gave pursuit. Eventually, they ran out of alley. They kept hidden behind a pair of garbage cans.

"We know you're here," one of the men shouted. "You have nowhere to go."

Jimmy and Alex looked at each other. "Do you have the…" Alex began.

Jimmy gave a tiny smile as he held up the IntComm and put on the glasses. "It doesn't really have the Clark-Kent-turning-to-Superman effect, does it."

"Wait, which Superman? I mean Christopher Reeve would be hard to top, but I never liked that guy who did that one in the early 2000s."

"I agree; that guy was a weenie."

Jimmy slowly stood with his hands up and walked into the middle of the alley. Alex carefully slid the IntComm out from behind the garbage cans and activated it, trying to keep a clear line between it and Jimmy's glasses.

"Both of you come out," the man ordered as the group of six surrounded Jimmy.

"Oh, I don't think she needs to."

"And what makes you say that?"

The man pushed his gun under Jimmy's chin. The IntComm activated and flooded Jimmy's mind with the proper program.

"Six against one is already unfair…for you."

Jimmy's hand shot up and pulled the gun away from his chin as he head-butted the man, knocking him back, while his foot came up to nail the man directly behind him in the face, taking him out. He spun and landed a roundhouse kick to a third man as the last three attacked. He thrust a palm strike at one and swept his leg to send that man to the ground. The last two managed to grab both of Jimmy's arms as the man he head-butted took out a large knife and charged at him.

He was met by a kick to the face.

He stumbled backwards as Alex sent another roundhouse kick to his face. She finished him off with a nasty haymaker as Jimmy jumped off the ground and flipped backwards to break away from the two men holding him. He grabbed both of their heads and rammed them into each other, knocking them out cold.

Jimmy then looked at his wife with a bit of irritation. "I could have gotten out of that."

"What, and I get to sit behind the garbage cans like some damsel in distress?"

"Well, next time, get yourself scanned to use the IntComm! It's not my fault it wasn't configured for you to use."

"You didn't even need it. You've taken out twice as many people without it."

"Yeah, over twenty years ago. I'm not a kid anymore."

Alex gave him the evil eye. "I beg to differ quite STRONGLY."

Jimmy exhaled in frustration. "Why did I say yes to marrying you?"

Alex raised an eyebrow. "Because you think I'm beautiful and smart, you're in love with me, and after all these years, I still do that one thing in bed that drives you wild."

Jimmy shook his head as he got on his IntComm to send Casey an update.

_**Hughes Hall, Cambridge, UK  
October 11, 2033  
3:00 PM GMT**_

John finished his last class of the day and started walking towards the recreation centre. It was getting a bit chilly outside, but he wanted to get in a run this afternoon to get his mind off of things. It was frustrating to know what was going on but to be unable to do anything about it. He agreed with everyone that it was safer if he pretended he didn't know what was going on, but that didn't make it any easier.

"Excuse me. Could you tell me where Selwyn College is?"

John turned as he saw the young woman approach him with a map of the campus. She was dressed in a hoodie and sweats with a backpack over her shoulder. In other words, she looked like every other student on the campus. Other than the ones who grew up thinking Oxford shirts and wool pants were play clothes.

"Um, sure." The woman handed him the map and he went to take a look. He did exactly as the woman hoped as she reached into her backpack while John concentrated on the map. He wasn't ready for the blast of spray that hit his face. He lost consciousness and fell forward into the waiting arms of the two large men who had walked up to them without him noticing.

_**New Scotland Yard, Victoria, London  
**__**October 11, 2033  
4:15 PM GMT**_

Liam walked down the hallway, keeping an eye on the cells. Most of them were empty, as most offenders never spent more than forty-eight hours at the holding facility here. Either they went to trial and posted bail, or they were transferred to facilities more suitably designed for holding inmates for longer periods of time. He was a bit nervous, but he knew he had to do this. Besides, Samantha seemed like a very nice person, and he was happy to do her a favor.

"Hello there," he said as he arrived at Samantha's cell. He took his keycard and swiped it, unlocking the door. He pulled it open and went inside.

"Are you sure you're ready?" Samantha asked him.

Liam nodded. "Ready as I'll ever be."

"OK, let's make this look good for the cameras."

Liam grabbed her and held her up against the wall, kissing her hard. Samantha returned the kiss while she cautiously slipped his keycard from his belt and then took his gun.

"Damn, you're a good kisser," Samantha whispered in his ear. "It's too bad I have a boyfriend."

"That's OK," Liam replied. "So do I."

"Really?"

"Yes. Eric and I got married two months ago."

"Wow. He's a lucky guy. I'll have to get you two a wedding present."

"Thanks."

"OK, here we go."

Samantha pushed back and pretended to pistol-whip Liam, who crumpled to a heap on the floor right on cue. Samantha peeked out into the hallway and ran down to the junction box. She opened the box and smashed the power source with the gun. The cameras were knocked out as she sprinted down the hallway to the lift. Using Liam's keycard, she got the doors to the lift opened, and she headed for the Lobby. She ran down the hallway, diving on the floor and sliding past two guards who "tried" to stop her, and she ran out to the loading dock. A black cab pulled up on the roadway leading to the docks. She leaped down from the platform and the taxi took off.

"Well timed, Miss Collins," Arthur Pollard said as he drove away. "That was very impressive. There are some clothes for you in the bag."

"Thanks. I hope I have lived up to your standards so far."

"We will see. Actually, we already have an assignment for you. We think you'll like it. It allows a certain amount of…retribution."

"What is it?"

"Tomorrow, you will go in and take out Chancellor Nolan. After all, what better way to prove you see things our way but to eliminate the person who tried to pin this entire mess on you."

Samantha tried to keep a good poker face, but it was clear she was already in over her head. "Hey, I just got out of prison and they'll be looking for me. Are you sure you want me to be going after such a big target?"

"Actually, you have three people to kill, thanks to the incompetence of some of our people. You'll also kill the woman who is leading the investigation. The director of the DNI in America, Alex Forrest. And her lapdog, Roger Murdock."

_Holy shit_, she thought to herself. _What the hell is going on?_ She had to think fast. "Wait a minute. You want me to kill three high-profile people tomorrow without as much as a plan? Is this how you normally run things?"

"We like to make sure our people can work when the pressure is on. However, if you like, we can give you some incentive."

"What do you mean?"

Pollard pulled the cab over and stopped. He took his iComm and placed it on the shelf between the front and back seats of the cab. He then hit a few buttons. A 3-D holographic image appeared.

Samantha was horrified to see John Bartowski blindfolded and handcuffed to a chair in the middle of what looked like a warehouse.

"Your boyfriend, correct?" Pollard said. The shocked expression on Samantha's face answered his question.

"So, Miss Collins. It's them…or him. What is your choice?"


	7. Methods and Mayhem

_I guess I was incorrect about there being seven chapters. I started writing the conclusion to this, and I was pushing 6,000 words without even being halfway done. Just to sort of reset my mind and organize my thoughts for the finale, I decided to split it up into two chapters. On the good side, I'll try to have the last chapter up towards the end of next week. It has to be better than watching my bracket get slaughtered in the NCAA Tournament._

_This chapter also cleaned up a few loose ends I was told I left in the prior chapter. The timeline jumps a bit backwards, so I hope you are ready for that._

_I have to admit this has been one of the tougher stories to write. What I'm discovering is that you have to have a solid beginning, middle, and end in mind when you start your story. Things can change while you're writing, but you have to have a plan in mind for how the story should generally go._

_As always, please leave a review. Authors love to hear what you have to say. In a weird way, we're like shock jocks and those idiots on TV like Glenn Beck or Keith Olbermann. (I covered both sides of the political spectrum, so no complaining.) We'd rather hear we can't write than hear nothing at all._

_Enjoy!_

* * *

**_MI-5 Headquarters, London__  
__October 11, 2033__  
__12:50 PM GMT_**

Tyler Cook waded through the crowd outside the doors of MI-5, trying to look as inconspicuous as possible. He knew setting off the halon systems in the computer lab would activate the fire alarms in the building, but that couldn't be helped. If the fire safety system didn't activate the alarms, there were two dozen people who would have been alerted the system had been activated and would have set the alarm off themselves.

But he could call Mr. Lightman in peace. Or at least without anybody caring about it.

"Mr. Lightman, it's done," Tyler said over the phone. "But Gerald and the other person were talking to someone on the phone while they were in the computer lab."

"Yes, I know," Mr. Lightman replied. "I just checked with my contact in the Metropolitan Police. Someone has tapped into the surveillance system around London. I suspect they were working together. Not to worry. I'll take care of them quickly. Report back to me if anything changes there."

"I will."

Mr. Lightman disconnected and looked at the time. Arthur Pollard would be picking up Samantha Collins in a few hours. By the time that happened, he figured to have everything in place, and Samantha would have no other outlet but to work for him. In doing his research, there were rumors that her mother, Carina, may have worked for either the British or American government at some point in the past but that couldn't be verified. If so, perhaps she was familiar with either Alex Forrest or Roger Murdock. It was a link that had to be broken, no matter how tenuous it might be.

He made two more calls: one to green-light the team watching Roger Murdock and one to Natasha Herbert, ordering her up to Cambridge. He wanted to make sure he had a back-up plan in place.

-/^\-

"Come on, Bartowski," Casey all but growled into his gComm. "Answer the goddamn phone, you stupid nerd."

"Anything?" Gertrude Verbanski asked.

Casey redialed. "Nothing on his GPS tracker. Maybe it got damaged."

Verbanski shook her head in frustration. "The closest street camera I can get is two blocks away. There are people milling around outside the building. The fire alarms must have gone off. No sign of Bartowski or Cooper."

"Dammit," Casey spat as he redialed Chuck's emergency phone for the fifth time in the past few minutes, hoping it wouldn't say once again that his number was not active.

It didn't. "Casey, is that you?"

Casey sat back in his chair and breathed a sigh of relief. "About time you picked up. What the hell is going on over there?"

"We're not sure. We think it was some sort of EMP device. It shorted out all of the computers in the basement and started a fire, and Cook disabled the fire doors on us so we couldn't get out. We made our way through the duct work to escape."

"Cooper with you?"

"He's OK. At least now we know who planted the files."

"I doubt some computer jockey was doing this alone," Casey replied. "He has to be working with others. That device you gave Carina to give to her daughter? It activated a while ago from inside the prison, so someone must have visited her. We told Scotland Yard to send us all the video they have."

"Good. That will be a big help. I just wish we had a way of contacting her directly."

"Not to worry, Bartowski. We're getting close."

"John," Verbanski interrupted. "I think we have company."

"Call you right back, Bartowski." Casey walked over to Verbanski's desk as she pointed at the monitors. "What's going on?"

"They just pulled up. Two males. I'm running them through the facial recognition software now."

Casey continued to look at the monitor, his hand tensing around the grip of his Sig Sauer R458. The two men walked to the trunk of the car and opened it, obscuring their faces from the view of Casey and Verbanski, who rose from her chair and reached for her gun as well.

The trunk slammed shut, and they saw both men wearing headphones.

"RUN!" Casey screamed, and the pair bolted for the opposite end of the building. One of the men shouldered the launcher in his hands and fired towards the building. Casey and Verbanski dove through a pair of windows and fell two stories into a pair of dumpsters as the projectile landed inside the structure, releasing its electronic wave. The two men quickly put the launcher back in the trunk of the car and sped away.

Casey and Verbanski got up slowly and tried to get their shaking legs under control, having landed on the outer edge of the weapon's range. They climbed out of the dumpsters and held on to them until their legs could support themselves.

"Now I'm pissed," Casey rasped.

"_Svoloch'_," Verbanski spat out. "Sons of bitches must have fried all of our data in there."

They walked around to the opposite end of the building with their guns drawn, but the two men responsible were long gone. They walked back to their setup. Sure enough, all of the monitors were showing nothing but static.

Verbanski picked up the projectile that almost ended their lives. "Skullbuster. Very powerful one. We were at least fifty yards away and we still felt it."

Casey nodded. "Now I know how Grimes felt when we were in Iran."

"See if you can get through to everybody. I'll get the backup computers from the car and start searching for area traffic cams, see if I can get a license plate."

"Yeah," Casey replied as he tried to call Chuck.

**_Kennington Police Station, Lambeth, London, UK__  
__October 11, 2033__  
__1:30 PM GMT_**

Jimmy breathed a sigh of relief. "Jesus, Case. I was starting to worry. What happened? We kept getting your voicemail."

"Looks like the bad guys are turning up the heat. They attacked Chuck, and they went after Verbanski and me."

"And us, too."

"What happened with you?"

"Bunch of hired punks tried to take Alex and me out. They're in custody with the Met."

"You get anything on them?"

"Nothing. Paid with a numbered account, no direct contact with whoever hired them."

"No, I mean with the Intersect. Anything in there?"

"That was the first thing I tried, Case. I got hits on two of them having links to crime families in England and Ireland. That's it. Nothing related to the NSA or SIS."

"Verbanski came up empty on the two who went after us. So we have only the one lead. The computer programmer you found who tried to kill Bartowski and Cooper."

"We should also get John. Clearly the gloves are off now. We better make sure he's safe."

"I'll send Walker and Miller to pick him up. You two find Chuck and find that computer programmer."

"Will do." Jimmy disconnected his gComm. "We have to find Chuck," he told Alex.

**_Hughes Hall, Cambridge, UK__  
__October 11, 2033__  
__3:10 PM GMT_**

Sarah and Carina exited Hughes Hall and looked around the tree-lined sidewalks. They hadn't been able to raise John on his iComm, but he may have set it to not disturb him during classes, which only ended for him ten minutes ago. They had gone to his apartment first to find his schedule. Although they couldn't be certain, Sarah knew John would have to walk through this area to get back to his flat. She hoped he would do that before going to any after-class activities he might have planned. Chuck and she gave thought to telling him to stay at his flat while not attending classes, but they were worried that could also tip off the bad guys.

She suddenly stopped dead in her tracks. She craned her neck and inhaled deeply.

"You got something, Sarah?" Carina asked. "At the risk of sounding like your nerdy husband, are your Spidey senses tingling?"

"Do you smell that?" Sarah asked.

Carina couldn't miss the look of panic in her eyes. She focused on the air around them. "Tell me that's not…" She stepped over to a nearby tree and examined the leaves. A group of leaves near the bottom of the tree…roughly six feet from the ground…had spotted discolorations the other leaves didn't. "Carfentanil," she replied, her fear matching Sarah's. "God knows how many times I've been hit with the stuff. I'd say it was sprayed here within the last ten to twenty minutes."

Sarah clutched her chest, her breathing becoming more and more rapid. "Hey, Sarah," Carina said forcefully as she guided her longtime best friend to a nearby bench. "Sarah!"

Sarah's began to hyperventilate, and tears began to form in her eyes. "John…oh God…John…"

"AGENT WALKER!" Carina bellowed as she grabbed Sarah's face to get her attention. "Come on, Sarah. I know it hurts, but you have to put Mom away for the moment. We need that nasty bitch inside of you right now. The one who made up part of the best spy team in American history. We think this through, we get the entire crew involved, and we will get John back."

Sarah was having trouble keeping her focus. Carina took her friend's hands. "Hey. _Förstår du_?"

Sarah looked up at her friend. Despite the terror she was feeling, she managed to nod and even gave a little smile. "_Rozumiem_."

Carina immediately got on her gComm. "Casey, they took John. Sarah and I will check with the security office here to see if they have any video surveillance of him being kidnapped."

There was a long pause on the other end. "Do whatever you can, Hansen. Keep an eye on her for us, OK?"

Carina nodded. "Promise. Did Chuck and Jimmy have any luck tracking down their guy?"

"Negative. He fell off the grid. But the good news is we'll have the video of the two people who visited your daughter this morning any minute, and the Met told me she plans to escape in about an hour. She might have some information on who contacted her."

"Maybe the Intersect has something on her visitors."

"Bartowski and Slade will head this way soon and we'll go through the video. They're briefing C on the latest information."

"OK, we'll be back there in a few hours."

"You got it."

Carina disconnected and turned to Sarah, who was still in a bit of a daze, although Carina could see a few telltale signs of the woman who used to be Langston Graham's wildcard enforcer in her eyes. It was a look Carina hadn't seen since Sarah met Chuck. She always prided herself on knowing her best friend better than she knew herself. She knew Sarah had fallen for Chuck. And now she knew all of them would get John back and take out the people responsible.

"Sarah?" Carina prodded her gently. "Are you ready?"

Sarah stood and nodded quietly. Carina led the way as the two went to the campus security office.

_**A40 Roadway, London  
October 11, 2033  
4:30 PM GMT**_

"So, Miss Collins. It's them…or him. What is your choice?"

Samantha stared at the image in front of her. She cursed herself inwardly for John being kidnapped. She knew there wasn't anything she could have done to prevent it, but that didn't stop her from feeling guilt over it. However, she had to pull it together quickly and hope everyone else had a plan in mind.

She exhaled slowly. "Nolan can burn in hell for all I care, but I've never killed innocent people before. What did they do wrong?"

"Consider it a reassurance of your commitment to us," Arthur Pollard replied. "Forrest and Murdock are hardly innocent. They're working for the same government that betrayed you, remember? And they are a threat to our plans."

Samantha sat in silence for a moment. She needed an excuse to get away from Pollard and contact the group for advice. "If you want me to kill them before tomorrow, you're going to have to give me some time to plan. It's not like I can walk into the Thames House and pull a gun on them. I need the chance to scout some possible locations to kill them."

"Very well. But we have no intention of letting you out of our sight." Pollard pulled the black cab into a supermarket parking lot and stopped next to another car. There were two people sitting in the front seat. "You will go with them. They will be with you at every turn, just in case you have a sudden desire to deviate from our plans. One call from them, and your boyfriend dies a very painful death."

Samantha could feel her entire being shiver as she exited the cab and got into the back seat of the other car. Killing Alex, Jimmy, and Chancellor Nolan was out of the question. But at the same time, she feared any attempt to contact the team would result in John being killed. She slumped back on the seat in the car as it drove to a nearby hotel. Suddenly she felt an object in the back of her pocket. Her eyes widened slightly at remembering she brought the device her mother gave her that morning to boost the surveillance signal at the prison.

_Maybe I can contact them_, she thought.

The car pulled up to a rundown hotel. The two men exited the front of the car and held the door open for Samantha. She exited the car and noticed the guns each man carried, aimed low so they wouldn't be noticed, although Samantha was certain they would not hesitate to use them. They walked inside the hotel, bypassed the registration desk, and went into a room that looked like it hadn't been updated in this century.

"Do you have a computer in that car?" she asked her two chaperones. "I'll need time to do some research."

One of the men wordlessly left the hotel room while the other kept watch on her. She walked towards the bathroom. The remaining man started walking in that direction. Samantha glared at the man.

"Unless you have some weird, kinky fetish, you stay here," she barked, closing the door in his face. She quickly retrieved the device Chuck made for her and studied it. She pulled the two sections apart to reveal the wiring and microchips inside the device. She stripped the wire leading to the battery. She began tapping the wire against the lead.

Fortunately for her, she knew someone who had spent several years in the military.

_**Plaza on the River, Westminster, London  
October 11, 2033  
4:40 PM GMT**_

Chuck, Jimmy, and Alex arrived at the residence where Alex and Jimmy were staying near MI-5 headquarters in as somber of a mood as Casey and Verbanski. What each of them feared in the backs of their minds but didn't dare say had happened. Casey wasted no time in calling them the minute it happened because Chuck deserved to know the truth about his son. Finding out sent Chuck into a state of panic, but Jimmy and Alex were able to get him to refocus. Being the optimist of their family, he realized it was simply a matter of when they would get John back, not if.

Given the friends who were with him, 'when' was a very short period of time in his mind.

"Anything?" Alex asked as they entered the room. Casey and Verbanski had already set up their equipment in the small office in the suite.

"Not so far," Verbanski replied quietly. "Carina called twenty minutes ago. The security office had a few shots of a car with four passengers, but the plates were registered to a dummy corporation. She should have Sarah back here in twenty or thirty minutes."

"Nolan's put a high-priority tasker on surveillance throughout London and is having the system reprogrammed to find Tyler Cook," Jimmy said. "If he sticks his head out, they'll find him."

Casey looked at the time. "Samantha should have broken out of prison by now. She would have contacted us by now if she could. I think we have to assume her visitors are watching her like a hawk."

"The good news is, we have the surveillance video from the prison," Verbanski continued. "Slade, could you have a look at the video?"

"Sure," Jimmy replied. He put on his Intersect glasses and activated the IntComm. He began to look through the video surveillance of Samantha's meeting with Arthur Pollard and Natasha Herbert. It took him a lot of time to look through the footage, which didn't ebb the tension in the room one bit.

"Dammit. Neither of them look at the cameras. Let me try the sound." He connected the IntComm to the computer so it would receive audio. "Still nothing."

"Well, it was worth a shot," Alex said. "We're not dealing with amateurs here. They knew to bring a scrambler to block the surveillance signal. They just didn't realize we'd beat them to it."

"Wait," Jimmy suddenly said. "Do we have the video from the camera over Samantha's left shoulder?"

"Sure," Verbanski replied as she switched files. "Did you catch something?"

"Maybe. A guard walked by, and the woman glanced at him for a split second. Let me see if that was enough."

The camera's display appeared on the monitor, and Jimmy forwarded the footage to the correct timestamp. He then ran the video at one-quarter speed. It worked. The Intersect gave the information to Jimmy.

"Well, she's in pretty good shape for a corpse," he said as he pointed to the woman who visited Samantha. "That's Natasha Herbert, a former SIS agent. Well, supposedly former agent. She disappeared off the grid, and MI-6 never found her. I guess we just did."

"Anything on the man with Herbert?" Casey asked.

"Nothing. Maybe Sam will be able to tell us something. Chuck, do you think she could use that thing you gave her to signal us? If she hasn't called by now, she must be…"

Casey suddenly snapped to attention at his computer as it beeped. "She is," he said curtly. "I'm getting an intermittent signal from the device. Three short, three long, three short. Morse code."

Jimmy nodded. "S.O.S. She knew you would pick up on it immediately."

Casey took out his gComm and programmed it to triangulate the signal. "Forrest, Slade, and I will go find her. Gertrude, stay here with Bartowski. Walker and Miller will be back any minute."

"I'm going with you," Chuck said, his voice more reminiscent of Casey's than his own.

"Not a good idea, Bartowski. You're needed here. You can look through the rest of the footage for clues."

"We're talking about my son," Chuck protested angrily.

Casey put a firm hand on Chuck's shoulder. "Chuck, you remember we told you how out of her mind Sarah went when the Belgian kidnapped you? Imagine what she's going through right now. She's going to need her husband."

Chuck looked at Casey. Instead of seeing the gruff, sarcastic former NSA agent, he saw a softer Casey, no doubt the Casey who was a father to two girls. In a way, he had only himself to blame. He was as much responsible for cracking Casey's armor as anyone else. He helped Casey regain his family and friends, two things Casey gave up to serve his country. Chuck wanted to think like an agent for the first time in a long while, but Casey knew Chuck needed to be a husband and father first.

"You're right," Chuck said quietly. "I'd be stopping you if our roles were reversed. Sorry, I just really want to…"

"Don't be sorry," Casey replied as he clapped Chuck's shoulder. "I know how you feel. I'd be off the reservation if something happened to my girls. But this is a simple rescue. We can handle it easily. Believe me, you will be involved in getting your son back."

Casey turned to Alex and Jimmy, who had a bag of equipment at the ready. "Let's go," he ordered. The three went to the door. Casey opened it to find Sarah and Carina about to knock.

"We have a lead on Samantha," Casey said. "We'll find her and bring her back."

Sarah nodded and pushed past them as she went to Chuck, who wrapped his arms around her. Casey, Jimmy, and Alex quickly left. Carina and Gertrude walked into the bedroom to give John's parents some alone time.

"Are you OK, baby?" Chuck gently whispered in her ear.

Sarah gripped him tightly as her eyes welled up. "I'm trying to be. Dammit, we should have seen this coming…"

"Sarah," Chuck said gently while he cradled her face. "We can't afford to talk about what we should or shouldn't have done. We need to get John back. And we will. I promise you that."

He wiped a tear from her face with his thumb. "I recall us being kidnapped not too long ago. And we have those same people helping us now."

Sarah smiled as she looked into those calming brown eyes of her husband's. "It's funny how I used to be the confident one who had to protect you. I guess those days are long gone."

Chuck shook his head. "You're still an excellent spy and protector. You just happen to be an even more wonderful wife and mother."

Sarah caressed his cheek and pulled him down for a kiss. "That's because I found the perfect guy with whom I could be in love and live my life."

"Is he taller than me?"

Sarah laughed when Chuck gave her his patented eyebrow dance. She grabbed his face and gave him an even harder kiss.

-/^\-

Casey, Jimmy, and Alex arrived at the run-down hotel from where Samantha's signal originated. They walked up to the registration desk, where a clerk who couldn't be less interested in his job stood.

"We were wondering if you could help us," Alex began. "A friend of ours invited us over and she forgot to tell us what room she was in. Tall redhead, about 20 years old?"

The clerk eyed Alex and up and down with a few salacious thoughts going through his head. "And what's in it for me?"

Alex raised an eyebrow. "Well, you can have this 100€ note if you're nice to us…" The clerk's eyes widened when he felt the barrel of a gun against his crotch. "…or my husband can solve that little problem you have of leering at me."

"She's in room 107," the clerk quickly replied.

"Anybody with her?" Casey asked.

"Two guys. At least, that's all I saw. They got here forty minutes ago."

Jimmy handed his gun to Alex. He then grabbed the keys to room 207. "Back in a minute, gorgeous," he said to Alex and gave her a kiss.

Casey moved down the hallway while Jimmy ascended the stairs to the next floor. He entered room 207 as Casey stood just outside of room 107.

"Ready to go, Case," Jimmy said quietly over their comms.

Casey reached over to knock on the door. "Pizza delivery."

Inside the room, one of the men trained his gun on Samantha as the other went to the door, firing away until his clip was empty. He then opened the door slowly.

And was greeted by Casey's fist.

At the same time, a loud crash was heard from the room above, followed by a large figure crashing through the window into their room. Samantha ducked and rolled out of the way as Jimmy took out his tranq gun and fired at the second man. He fell to the floor unconscious.

Casey stared across the room at Jimmy. "Twenty years and you still have to do things the hard way," he said with ample condescension.

"Oh, please," Jimmy replied with equal disdain. "Any idiot can punch someone. At least I put a little style into my rescues."

Samantha looked back and forth between the two of them. "Has it always been like this? You two bickering like an old married couple?"

"Don't get me started," both Casey and Jimmy huffed at the same time.

Casey pulled the body of the first man to lie next to the second one as Alex entered the room. "Are you OK, Samantha?" she asked.

She shook her head. "They took John."

"We know. Everyone else is trying to piece together what happened."

"If I don't kill Chancellor Nolan, Jimmy, and you, they'll kill John."

"Who are these people who visited you this morning?" Casey asked.

"I'm not sure, but it sounds like they're some rogue group within MI-6. A lot like that Ring group we studied in training that you guys took down. They said Nolan was to blame for ordering the hit on Michelle and I played along, acting like I wanted revenge. I didn't know about John until after I escaped, I swear."

"Easy, Sam," Jimmy replied. "Nobody's mad at you. In fact, we've identified the woman. Her name is Natasha Herbert. Ex-agent, supposed to have died several years ago. She makes Casey's first years look like he was a schoolteacher."

Samantha's blood went ice cold. "It was her," she said quietly, the hatred rising quickly within her as she put the pieces together. "She was the one who murdered Michelle. I'm going to kill that bitch."

"Hang on, Samantha," Alex gently replied. "Don't lose your focus. That's how a good agent turns into a dead agent. That's why we came to get you instead of Chuck and Sarah. You can't go off on some vendetta and lose the bigger picture. We're here to stop this group, not seek revenge. We do this together, OK?"

Samantha took a long breath and nodded. "What can I do to help?"

Casey took a look over the room. "Forrest, pull the car around to the window. Slade, contact the Chancellor and give him an update. I think we'll have to go old school on breaking these clowns."

Samantha looked at Casey in confusion as he made a few calls.

_**Canary Wharf, East London, UK  
October 11, 2033  
6:30 PM GMT**_

Jimmy took a water bottle and sprayed the faces of the two men who were assigned to watch Samantha. It had been over three hours since John was kidnapped, and Sarah, who was standing behind the two men, was neither a patient spy nor mother. However, Carina had given Chuck and her a similar speech to the one Alex gave Samantha. She had to concede she would have done the same thing if Samantha or Casey's daughters or Alex's nieces were the ones to have been kidnapped. As long as she got to be involved, she would let the others run the show.

"Wake up," Jimmy taunted the two men, smacking each in the face.

"What do you want, old man?" one of the men said, attempting some bravado despite being handcuffed and bound to his chair.

Jimmy laughed. "Tough talk coming from a couple of low-life punks whom a couple of senior citizens got the drop on. Now you boys are in big, big trouble. You've been mixed up with extortion, murder, and treason. That's bad enough. But then you decided to piss off Mama Bear. The lady behind you? You kidnapped her son."

Both men turned their heads to see Sarah, who looked ready to take them alive. "Yeah, so what?" the second man said.

"You're going to tell us where her son is," Jimmy said calmly. "And if you cooperate with us, maybe you only get five to ten behind bars."

The two men laughed. Jimmy shrugged in indifference. "Or, I can just walk out of here and leave you Mama Bear's capable hands. Who, by the way, was trained in over 200 ways to kill someone."

"250," Sarah replied matter-of-factly.

Jimmy turned to her in shock and walked out of earshot of the two men. "250? They only taught me 200. You mean you learned 50 more AFTER you left the CIA?"

Sarah shrugged. "Sometimes, Chuck was away on business trips. I got lonely."

Now Jimmy was even more surprised. "You know, most people settle for phone sex. Or stuff they put in the top drawer of their nightstand."

"I do NOT have anything in the top drawer of my nightstand," Sarah snarled in offense.

"Oh come on. You're friends with Carina all those years and you have NOTHING in the top drawer of your nightstand? Hell, the top drawer in Alex's nightstand is an entire closet."

"Focus, Jimmy!" Sarah growled.

Jimmy put his hands up in surrender. "Sorry, sorry. Look, I know how much you want to do the dirty work, but we have to stick to the plan, OK? It'll get these guys to talk. Casey's done it before, and Chuck agreed to it."

"He saw it on a TV show," Sarah replied scornfully.

"I know; I saw the same episode of _Burn Notice_ all those years ago. But it's just like any other form of interrogation; 90% is in selling it, right? So let me do this."

Sarah glared at him for a moment before her features softened. "OK, Jimmy. But this better work."

He gave her a smile. "It will, kiddo. Promise."

Sarah rolled her eyes. "Do you ever plan to stop calling me kiddo? I'm 53, for God's sake. I could be a grandmother in a couple of years."

"Do you ever plan to stop smacking me upside the head whenever I make a crack about myself?"

"No," Sarah said firmly.

"Well, you have your answer," Jimmy replied with a grin as he walked back to the two men.

"Sorry to keep you waiting," Jimmy said as he pushed each of their chairs towards a floor-to-ceiling window. "Here's what we're going to do. One of you will tell us everything we want to know. The other one of you will go from the 20th floor of this building to the first floor in the shortest time possible. Through that window right in front of you. Now who wants to do what?"

Jimmy took out a gun and fired a dozen shots in to the window. The glass fractured from floor to ceiling. He then took an axe and started knocking the glass out of the frame, leaving a large opening directly in front of the two chairs.

"Last chance, boys," Jimmy said as he put a blindfold on each man. He then grabbed the back of each chair and tipped them forward, leaning them out of the window. Both men started screaming.

"Anybody feel like talking?" Both men continued to scream incoherently. "Eenie," Jimmy started, shaking one of the chairs. "Meenie…" He shook the other chair. "Miney…" He shook the first chair again. "Who's my favorite Stooge? Moe!"

Jimmy shoved the chair of the second man out the window, whose screams faded as he fell.

"We don't know where he's being kept!" the first man screamed. "I swear! I just know the guy who's holding him!"

"Keep talking," Jimmy said.

"We were all hired from the same gang. They separated us, gave us different roles. We were supposed to keep an eye on the girl while she planned to kill some people. There are four people watching her son."

"Do you have a way of contacting your buddy?"

The man nodded as Jimmy pulled his chair away from the window. Jimmy then took out his gComm. "What's the number?"

-/^\-

The man continued to scream in terror as he felt himself fall to the ground. Suddenly, he stopped moving. Before he could react, he felt a piece of tape being put over his mouth. The chair was dragged upward. His blindfold was removed as he felt the chair land on solid ground. The man looked behind him to see a heavy-duty cable attached to the back of his chair, and two men were dragging him back into the building. The man who was talking to them upstairs must have attached it after he put the blindfold on.

"You better be in a talking mood now, or we'll throw you out for real this time. No rope attached to your chair," Casey said to the man as he ripped the tape off of his mouth. "Where is the person you kidnapped?"

"We were just hired by this group, OK?" the man said. "We don't know where that woman's son is; we just know the guys holding onto him."

"He's telling the truth, Case," Chuck replied with the Intersect glasses on. "He must be part of the same group who attacked everybody today. No ties to MI-6 or any other spy agency."

"What about me?" Samantha asked the man. "Did you plan to kill me once I carried out my assignment?"

"No, but someone else will. He's supposed to watch you murder the Chancellor and then I guess he kills you. None of us are part of that."

Samantha grabbed Gertrude's computer and showed the prison footage to the man. "Is this the person?"

"Yes," the man replied with a vigorous nod. "He's the one who gave us our assignments. But someone else is in charge."

"Who?"

"We don't know. We never saw him; we just heard his voice. It's like it was straight out of a movie. He told us what the punishment would be if we screwed up. Then she put a knife to one of the guy's throats to demonstrate."

"She?"

"The lady in that footage. Same woman. Kind of hard to forget her."

Alex's gComm beeped. "Hello?" she asked. "OK, hang on to him. We're getting the rest of the information now." Alex disconnected and turned to Casey. "James said he has the phone number of one of the people holding John. One call to the man's phone, and we'll have John pinpointed."

"Thank God," Chuck said. "Let's bring him home."

"Chuck, if we just rescue John, we'll be doing this again in six months, if not sooner," Casey replied. "We have to put an end to this organization right now. If we do this right, we can kill two birds with one stone."

"How?"

Casey turned to Samantha. "They want you to kill Forrest, Slade, and the Chancellor. I think that's what you should do."


	8. Hard Targets

_And I was able to write the conclusion in one chapter. Although that's not to say I didn't stretch this baby out a lot more than I expected. Also, that theory about the ideas all coming at once certainly applied. A good 2/3 of this chapter was written today alone. I don't know why it happens like that, but it does._

_A very special thanks to all of you who read it, and a bigger thanks to those of you who left reviews, especially **East Coast Captain**, **Garnetflint**, **Phnxgirl**, **Jimmy 144**, **Osced**, **Michael 66**, **Katsamura**, and I apologize if I left anybody out._

_The bad news is, my next Forrest & Slade story might take a while to start. The good news is the reason for that is I finally got a job. Yay! I'll be doing number crunching for an insurance company in Chicago who needs my computer skills. Guess I fooled them, huh? :-D_

_Enjoy the last chapter, please leave reviews, and I'll talk to everyone in **Forrest & Slade: The Beckman-Turner Overdrive Mission**._

* * *

_**Unknown Location, London, UK  
**__**October 11, 2033  
**__**6:30 PM GMT**_

John slowly awoke to find himself handcuffed and sitting on a hard folding chair in the middle of a warehouse. He blinked slowly to clear his vision as he tried to figure out what the hell happened. His eyes and nostrils still stung, no doubt the result of whatever that bitch sprayed him with. Twenty feet away, a group of four men sat around a table and paid very little attention to him, other than taking the occasional glance in his direction. John kept his movements to a minimum so they wouldn't keep more of an eye on him.

_Why the hell didn't Uncle Jimmy let me keep that Intersect?_ he thought to himself. If he had that, he would have been able to break out of here easily. He couldn't even imagine what his parents were going through right now. They kept him from helping with Samantha's problems because they were afraid he would be kidnapped. And then he gets kidnapped anyway. It frustrated him to no end someone was doing this to Samantha, to his family and friends, and to him. The urge to spring into action was bubbling to the surface, but he had to resist it. After helping rescue his parents seven months ago, he learned you had to pick the right moment to act. He didn't when Daniel Shaw called him, and it was only through Sam's intervention that he didn't get himself killed. Attempting an escape right now could yield the same result, and it was pointless to do so without knowing more about what was going on. The only thing he knew for certain was he had a little bit of time. He figured they wouldn't kidnap him unless they were either forcing Samantha to do something or whatever it was they were doing had gone wrong and they were desperate.

Suddenly, John heard the clicking of heels against the concrete floor. He turned his head to see a woman approach him. The same woman who had kidnapped him a few hours ago.

"I see you're awake," Natasha Herbert said as she glared condescendingly at John. "It shouldn't be long. Once your girlfriend does as we requested, you'll be free to go."

John shook his head and gave a derisive laugh. "Problem?" Herbert asked.

"It's bad enough you kidnapped me, but now you're going to insult my intelligence by claiming you'll let me go? Even I can lie better than that," John seethed.

Herbert shrugged and smiled. "Fine, but your girlfriend doesn't know that. That's our advantage. If she doesn't do what we want, we'll kill both of you. If she does, you'll die and we'll tell her British Intelligence raided this warehouse and you were killed in the crossfire. Revenge can be quite the motivation for her to join us."

"Join who?"

"Our organization is always looking for talented people. People who truly understand the way of the world and wish to do something about it."

John started to laugh. "What is so funny?" Herbert asked, her temper beginning to rise.

"I've heard that BS before. You sound like a Bond villain. And not one of the good ones, either."

Herbert took out her gun and stuck in John's face. "You couldn't possibly know what I've been through in my life. To have the government use my talents, my mind, my body, only to throw it out like so much garbage."

"Yeah, you'll get a lot of sympathy from the guy you kidnapped and handcuffed to a chair. Face it, lady. You're just another sad, pathetic loser who didn't get what they wanted in life and now wants to hurt innocent people because of it."

Herbert took the gun and hit John across the face with it. His head snapped to the side. He then slowly turned back to face her, spitting blood out of his mouth that landed on her shirt.

"Oooh, that really hurt," John deadpanned, his eyes daggers at her. "Thank you for proving I'm right."

Herbert shoved the gun under John's chin. "What makes you think I won't kill you right now?" she said in barely-contained fury.

"Because you would have done it already," John replied evenly. "You need me alive. Or maybe you're just too chicken shit to do it yourself."

Herbert cocked the gun, but John continued to stare defiantly. "It must really frustrate the hell out of you that you will never scare me. You pull that trigger, you might as well kill yourself. It'd be far less painful than what you'll have coming to you."

Herbert was interrupted by a ringing iComm. She backed away from John and turned towards the table. One of the men sitting there answered.

"What did I tell you about talking to anyone?" Herbert yelled at the man who answered the phone.

"It's them. The ones with the girl. She wants to talk to you."

Herbert walked over to the table and snatched the iComm from the man's hand.

_**Canary Wharf, East London, UK  
**__**October 11, 2033  
**__**6:50 PM GMT**_

Samantha took the phone away from the thug who called his partner. So far, both of the men they captured were on their best behavior. The fact each had a gun pointed at their heads by Casey and Verbanski may have had something do to with that. Now it was time to see if Chuck's little trick with the iComm would work.

"Agent Collins? Do you have a plan?" Herbert asked over the phone.

"Yes," Samantha replied. "We don't have to wait until tomorrow. I know where Nolan will be tonight. I was able to hack his calendar on his assistant's computer. He's having dinner in the West End at 8:00 PM tonight. Even better, he's having dinner with Forrest and Murdock. If you can get your hands on a sniper rifle for me, I can shoot them from a flat across the street from the entrance. Specifically, I need a Diemaco C10."

"Why that one?"

"Because that's what I trained on and I don't have enough time to get comfortable with a different rifle," Samantha lied. "Will that be a problem?"

"No, not a problem. Tell the two men with you exactly what you need. They'll get it for you. What is your exit strategy?"

"The flat across the street has one of those old chutes people used to throw refuse in. You have someone retrieve the rifle from there. Meanwhile, there is a pub a block over from the flat opposite of the restaurant. I want all of you there in the back room, including John."

"Why do you want him there?"

"I told you before; I don't want anyone harmed when they don't have to be. Besides, what can I do with him? I have to dump him. I'll make up some excuse, tell him I'm going away."

"Or we can take care of him," Herbert replied with the mental image of John dying a slow, painful death running through her mind.

"What, do you think I'm going to negotiate against myself?" Samantha replied angrily, the bile rising in her throat from even talking to this bitch. "What incentive do I have to work for you if you're going to break your promises? I will deal with getting rid of him, not you. Otherwise this ends right now and I'll take my chances with the bookends."

"Very well," Herbert replied, not really caring since Samantha's boyfriend would never be brought to her anyway. "Anything else?"

"Yes. I want to meet your boss."

"Sorry, but that's not happening."

"Look, I'm risking my life just to prove my loyalty to this person. I want to know from them directly what their plans are for me. I'm not going to sit around being some sort of glorified hitwoman. Any idiot can do that. I want to know how I fit in and what the organization can do for me."

There was a long pause on Herbert's end of the line. "I'll tell him. But it's his decision. I cannot guarantee he'll do it."

"Very well. I'm going to take the two guys you left with me, get the rifle, and scout the location. I'll call you from there."

Herbert heard the click as the call disconnected. Arthur Pollard insisted they get rid of Samantha, and she would have been very happy to take care of that. But she figured Mr. Lightman would make the final decision. Maybe he saw something in Samantha she didn't.

She ran the trace program on the phone to verify the call came from the hotel where they took Samantha. "Excellent," she said to the men sitting there, talking low enough so John wouldn't hear it. "I will join her at the pub, and then I will call you and let you know when to kill him."

-/^\-

"Did it work, Chuck?" Samantha asked in anticipation.

He nodded. "The program in the computer sent an encrypted file through the iComm to theirs so it would give the coordinates of the hotel you were at. As far as they know, you never left the place."

"And we have their location?"

Casey nodded with confidence. "We'll get into position. But you have to sell this, Samantha. Once you meet with them, you have to convince them you're ready to join their group. Then you ask them to bring John to you."

"Presumably, they'll hold him at that warehouse and give the order to kill him," Jimmy continued. When that happens, give us a signal."

"How?"

Jimmy handed her a pair of shoes suitable for running. "There's no place like home, Dorothy. Just click the heels three times on these things. The booster in the shoes is powerful enough that the signal will go out no matter what sort of jamming device they might bring to the meet. That'll be the go-ahead for John's rescue. And Alexandra and I will come busting in to take down the group's leaders."

"OK," Samantha replied nervously as she sat down on a nearby chair. Sarah walked over and sat down next to her.

"Samantha?" Sarah gently prodded.

"I…I never wanted it to come to this. I really didn't think they would go this far." She kept her head down, afraid to look John's mother in the eye. "I wish I knew how you could be so calm about this."

Sarah smiled. "You weren't here earlier. And believe me, if it wasn't for Carina and Chuck and everybody being here, I would be a complete wreck."

Sarah gently grabbed Samantha's chin and lifted it up so she was looking at her. "You've done everything right. It's obvious these people are desperate if they've kidnapped my son. We will stop them. But we need your help to do it."

Samantha exhaled slowly. "Being a spy is not for the timid, is it."

"No, it isn't. But I recall a young woman full of fire and determination who helped my son rescue his parents seven months ago. That woman is a spy. She's going to be one of the best." Sarah took Samantha's hands. "And I'm hoping she can help us in bringing John home."

Samantha nodded gently. "I will." Sarah hugged her tightly. Samantha then stood from her chair and walked over to her two 'escorts', both of whom were tied up at the other end of the room. "Now, if you two wish to live to see tomorrow, I suggest you do everything we tell you."

_**Regent Street, West End, London, UK  
**__**October 11, 2033  
**__**8:15 PM GMT**_

Mr. Lightman waited patiently for an update from Natasha Herbert. He knew Samantha Collins was willing to assassinate Chancellor Nolan and his two American helpers, and the report Herbert gave him made him consider his work in securing the rookie agent was worth the effort. Someone of her skill set would be quite valuable in his new organization.

His iComm beeped. He saw the name of Tyler Cook on the ID. "What is it?"

"I have some good news, but I have a lot of bad news. The good news is I kept an eye on things at British Intelligence, and a report was released that two people were found in the computer labs in the basement, so it appears Gerald Cooper and the man with him are dead."

"And the bad news?"

"I expanded my search trying to find out more about Samantha Collins, specifically the time period when she was in the States seven months ago. I hacked into the systems of the U.S. Justice Department and found out a high-profile prisoner escaped right around the time Samantha was there. His name was Daniel Shaw."

"Shaw. I met him many years ago. It was a shame to see him become so unhinged."

"When that name popped up, that put all of the pieces together, so to speak. Shaw was trying to find the people who put him behind bars in the first place, Chuck and Sarah Bartowski. Supposedly they have two children. I'll just bet one of them was Samantha Collins' boyfriend. That would explain how a kid would be involved with the CIA like that."

"How does Collins fit in?"

"It's a longshot, but it would fit the scenario. Have you ever heard of Carina Miller?"

"She worked for several American agencies before moving here a few years back. But she hasn't made any noise in quite a while."

"Except perhaps have a daughter. The same Agent Samantha Collins. That would tie everybody together. Bartowski, Miller, Forrest, Murdock, all of them."

Lightman exhaled slowly. He had really hoped Collins could be turned, but it was clearly impossible given the company she kept. "Thank you for the information, Mr. Cook. Sadly, Agent Collins' promising career will have to be cut short tonight."

Mr. Lightman disconnected from Tyler Cook with considerable disappointment. He then decided to make a couple of calls to arrange some insurance. All he could hope for now was that Collins carry out the assassinations of Nolan, Forrest, and Murdock. She would still be a big help to his organization if she were to complete that task.

Even if it would be the last thing she ever did.

_**Aqua Nueva Restaurant, West End, London, UK  
**__**October 11, 2033  
**__**9:25 PM GMT**_

Samantha looked out the small window at the entrance to the restaurant across the street, gently cradling the Diemaco C10 rifle her escorts provided for her. The team was worried they might have attempted to signal their friends at the warehouse where a huge cache of weapons was being stored. However, Alex and Jimmy were waiting outside, having accompanied them to make sure things went smoothly, and one word from Samantha would have ended their lives.

She motioned to the men with her. "Bring that chair over here."

As they turned to get the chair sitting at the opposite end of the room, she removed the magazine from the rifle and replaced it with the special magazine Casey prepared for her. One of the men placed the chair next to the window, and Samantha took a seat. She uncapped the telescopic sights and took aim out the window. There was a steady stream of people walking past the restaurant, but there was a small opening just to the right of the doors where she would have a clear shot at anybody who stood there. That's where Alex, Jimmy, and Chancellor Nolan would stand, pretending to wait for their car to pull up. Casey admitted it had been a few years since he tried this, Verbanski and he had developed special rifle shells that were ideal for this scenario. She hoped they worked like he promised.

She closed her eyes for a brief moment and controlled the pattern of her breathing. She knew she had to pull off three consecutive shots, so she wanted her breathing pattern to be exact. It may have been a basic skill to learn when using a sniper rifle, but her instructors couldn't emphasize it enough. Once she was satisfied, she opened her eyes and looked at the target.

The timing was perfect. Chancellor Nolan handed his keys to the valet and stood in the opening. Alex and Jimmy stood next to him.

Samantha closed her left eye and looked through the telescopic sight with her right. She took aim at Nolan's chest and released the safety on the rifle. She inhaled slowly, held her breath, counted to three in her mind, and fired a shot. Chancellor Nolan fell back against the wall as blood exploded from his chest. Samantha exhaled, took aim at Alex, and inhaled. She locked on and fired a second shot with the same result. Finally she aimed at Jimmy and fired, and he slumped to the ground as well, his coat and shirt covered with blood.

Samantha put the safety on the rifle and turned to the two men with her. "Got all three," she said quietly.

"What now?" one of them asked, which didn't surprise Samantha given they didn't let the two men in on the plan.

"I don't need you two anymore." Samantha drew her tranq gun and fired a shot at each man. The two lost consciousness and fell to the ground. Samantha took the rifle and replaced Casey's cartridge with the rifle's original cartridge. She then took the safety off and fired three shots into the ceiling, just in case the two men sent to recover the rifle were ordered to verify it was actually fired and collected all six shell casings. She put the safety on again and went for the door, taking a homing beacon out of her pocket and activating it. It was a signal for the Metropolitan Police to pick up the two men and to signal everybody else to get into position. She ran down the hallway to the refuse chute and dropped the gun in the bin. She wasn't sure if they would really recover the rifle, although it wasn't going to matter anyway. She descended the stairs quickly and exited out of the back of the building. She hopped over two fences and made her way to The Argyll Arms.

-/^\-

Chaos still reigned outside of Aqua Nueva as a large ambulance pulled up. Three stretchers immediately came out of the back of the ambulance, and EMTs placed the bodies of Alex, Jimmy, and Chancellor Nolan on them. They quickly loaded the three into the ambulance and sped away to the hospital.

At least, that's what they wanted the shaken crowd to think they did.

A low groan was heard as Chancellor Nolan sat up in his stretcher. "I can't lie; that hurt quite a bit," he said through gritted teeth as he pulled off his jacket and removed the exploded gel packs from his chest. He then removed the radio transmitter that picked up the signal from Samantha's fired shell casings that set off the gel packs.

"Yeah, Casey doesn't really follow OSHA guidelines when he fakes an assassination," Jimmy grumbled as he removed his packs and transmitter. Alex did the same with hers.

"Sir?" One of the attendants, an MI-5 agent playing the role of an EMT, got the Chancellor's attention. "Met's on the line for you, sir."

"Nolan," the Chancellor said as he took the proffered phone from the agent. "Really? Good. Get everything written up and send it to me here right away." He disconnected the call. "The Met picked up Tyler Cook an hour ago. He has been very, very cooperative."

_**Argyll Arms Pub, West End, London, UK  
**__**October 11, 2033  
**__**9:40 PM GMT**_

Samantha entered the pub and made her way to a back room where three people sat alone at a single table. Samantha recognized two of them: the woman and the man who visited her earlier at the prison. She assumed the older gentleman also seated at the table was the head of the organization. So far, this was working exactly as everyone had hoped.

"Take a seat," the older gentleman said. Samantha sat in the chair opposite of him and tried to remain calm, even though her entire being was on edge.

"Quite a show you put on, Miss Collins," the older gentleman said.

"You asked for them to be killed. I accomplished my task. Now what are your plans for me?"

"Quite honestly, I'm disappointed. I had really hoped I found a proverbial diamond in the rough in discovering you. And I commend you for your performance given you're the youngest agent the SIS has had in over half a century. But just like your superiors, I have my sources, too. And they told me you are familiar with Director Forrest and former Agent Murdock. In fact, you helped them recover your boyfriend's parents seven months ago."

Samantha could feel her hands gripping the chair underneath the table. Casey and Forrest both warned her this could happen, but that didn't make the moment any less frightening.

"What are you talking about?" Samantha asked.

"No sense in denying it, Miss Collins. Whether you were trying to play us for fools or you were desperate to get their son back, you never would have joined our organization of your own free will."

Samantha looked at each of the three. She then focused on Natasha Herbert, who bore a depraved smile. "Well, I'm not the only liar here. You never planned to let John go, did you."

Herbert shook her head. "Honestly, I'm surprised you had the guts to carry out the assassinations anyway."

Natasha Herbert dialed a number on her iComm. "Go ahead," were her only words. Under the table, Samantha raised her heels and gently clicked them together three times.

Herbert turned to her. "Nervous, Samantha?" Herbert teased. "You should be. To be honest, I wouldn't mind going back to when I saw things the way you do. A young optimist who thought she would save the world. But after you've killed countless people, stole enough to retire on a dozen times and spread your legs for every last lowlife who crossed your path, you discover the world doesn't care about you. It is a cruel master, and the only person you can rely on is yourself."

Samantha stared for a moment before a smile spread across her face. "Well, I guess that's the one thing I learned that you never did. I know I'm not alone."

The door to the back room burst open. Carina, Alex, Jimmy, and Chancellor Nolan entered with guns drawn.

"Uh-uh," Jimmy said to Pollard, who tried to reach for his weapon. He put his gun to Pollard's head and took Pollard's gun from its holster.

"You're not dead?" Pollard rumbled.

Jimmy shrugged. "I suck at it."

Samantha bolted up from her chair and slammed Herbert's head against the table. She held her neck in place while she searched her, retrieving the gun behind Herbert's back and her backup in an ankle holster.

"David Lightman," Chancellor Nolan spat out as he looked at the man in utter contempt. "To think, there's a star on the wall in your memory. I don't even plan to wait until the morning to rip that thing down. I should have guessed a sick bastard like you would kill innocent agents for your own personal gain."

Lightman smirked. "Quite the oxymoron, Tim. You of all people knows nobody is innocent in our business. You betrayed an old friend once."

"An old friend I caught selling technology to the Iranian government fifteen years ago."

"What can I say? Pity you could never prove that. I enjoy money and I don't like to follow anyone's political agenda but my own."

"Yes. High atop the mountain you made out of the corpses of all of those people you killed over the years."

"The Russians killed each other. So did India and Pakistan. I just made a handsome profit from it."

Nolan shook his head. "And you're still the same piece of rubbish you were back then. You want power and respect, no matter how little you deserve either one. Thankfully, you're little computer programmer has been cooperating with us, so you won't be bothering anyone again. You're an insignificant speck with a severe Napoleon complex."

Lightman's eyes flared in anger for a moment before calming down. "Unlike you, however, I am not a fool."

The door opened once again, and the five agents found themselves surrounded by a dozen men. Herbert and Pollard rose from the table and took everyone's weapons.

"Have a seat," Lightman said calmly. Carina, Samantha, Alex, Jimmy, and Nolan looked around at the dozen men surrounding them, their guns leveled right at their heads. Reluctantly, they sat down on one side of the table. Samantha looked at her mother, whose expression remained impassive.

She really wished she knew how her mother could remain so calm when they were about to be executed.

_**Unknown Location, London, UK  
**__**October 11, 2033  
**__**9:45 PM GMT**_

Chuck readied his tranq guns as Sarah stood by his side. He also checked to see the IntComm was activated and ready in case he needed it. Casey and Verbanski stood by the door on the opposite side of the warehouse from them.

"Is everybody ready?" Casey whispered over their comms.

"Ready," Chuck replied.

"Ready," Sarah added.

Casey turned to Verbanski, who nodded in consent. Casey and Sarah stuck a small cube of T-4 explosive to the hinges and the locks of the warehouse doors and inserted a detonator into each. All four moved quickly away from the charges and switched their remote detonators to the "ready" position. Casey took one last look inside the warehouse and noticed one of the four men answering their IntComm.

"Yes," the man said into the IntComm. "OK." He disconnected and grabbed his gun. He then walked over to John and knelt down to be at eye level.

Casey's eyes widened. "We go in three…two…one…"

"Do you prefer the head or the chest?" the man said.

"Like it really matters?" John growled at the man.

The man shrugged and began to rise to his feet. Suddenly a loud explosion could be heard from both sides of the warehouse. The four men, including the one with the gun, stared in shock at seeing the two doors blown away. John pushed off of his feet, still tied to the chair, and head-butted the man with the gun under his chin. The man staggered backwards, and John swung the chair hard, nailing the man in the head and knocking him out. The other three men reached for their weapons, but one fell from Chuck's tranq gun. The other two tried to run, but Sarah knocked one out with a roundhouse kick, while Verbanski took the other one out with the butt of her automatic weapon.

"Mom! Dad!"

Chuck and Sarah ran over to John and hugged him tightly. "Are you OK?" Sarah asked as Chuck procured a skeleton key to removed John's handcuffs. Sarah pulled out a knife to cut the ropes around John's ankles.

"I'm fine, Mom. Is Samantha OK?"

"Hopefully. She sent the signal. Carina, Alex, and Jimmy are trying to retrieve her now."

"Who were these people? What did they want with me?"

"They're part of a rogue group inside of British Intelligence, just like we suspected. They set Samantha up and kidnapped you to force her to kill Alex, Jimmy, and Chancellor Nolan. But we staged the whole thing when we were able to lock onto the phone signal of one of the men holding you."

"We can do the Scooby-Doo explanations thing later, preferably over some eggs and bacon and a bottle of scotch," Casey said. "But we need to get out of here right now."

"You're right, John," Sarah replied. The five went to the door and toward Casey's vehicle with John leading the way. The sound of gunfire suddenly filled the air.

"Get down!" John yelled as he leaped back, tackling the other four down in the process. They quickly moved away from the door as a group of twenty men fired away.

_**Argyll Arms Pub, West End, London, UK  
**__**October 11, 2033  
**__**10:00 PM GMT**_

Carina, Samantha, Alex, Jimmy, and Chancellor Nolan stared at the men holding them in the back of the pub. Given they were unarmed and outnumbered three-to-one, their hopes of escape appeared slim at best.

"You know," Lightman began. "I almost feel bad about ending your lives. So much talent assembled in vain. It's like destroying a Renoir. Well, in your cases, maybe a Picasso, given how sideways you people operate."

Lightman laughed at his own joke. Samantha hung her head. "I'm sorry, Mother," she said quietly.

"For what?" Carina replied.

"For getting everybody involved in this, especially you. You did all of that work to help me, encouraged me to be an agent, and it's over before it ever really began."

Carina smiled. "Then you're apologizing for no reason, Sam. We've gotten out of tougher situations than this before."

Samantha stared at all of the guns pointed at them. "You have?"

Carina took her daughter's hand. "You forget who you're friends with? The impossible is our specialty."

"She's right," Jimmy replied as he slowly extracted his emergency phone from his back pocket. "We just have to give Jenny a call."

Alex raised an eyebrow and glanced at the Chancellor sitting at her left.

"Jenny who?" Samantha asked.

Jimmy punched 867-5309 on his phone and hit Send. "Nice girl. Really lights up a room."

Jimmy threw his phone into the air and ducked down, putting his Intersect glasses on in the process. Alex tackled Nolan to the ground while Carina grabbed her daughter and turned her away. All five of them shut their eyes as the flashbang in the phone went off, blinding Lightman, Pollard, Herbert, and all of their men. Jimmy leaped up as the light subsided, and his Intersect flooded his mind with the right program. He performed two consecutive spinning kicks to knock the guns out of the hands of Lightman's men. He then took out two of them with a single roundhouse kick. Alex and Carina got up as two men went after them, taking both down with a punch on each. Another man tried to attack, but Nolan tripped him from his prone position. He quickly got to his knees and landed a shot to keep him down. Lightman, Pollard, and Herbert ran for the doors as the remaining men tried to attack. Jimmy landed a haymaker on one, pirouetted, and connected an elbow at another. Samantha landed a roundhouse kick on another thug as Carina and Alex pulled Nolan to his feet. They stood and watched as Jimmy took out two more men with a flurry of punches. The last two tried to attack him, but Jimmy pushed off the back of a chair and scissor-kicked his legs, knocking both men out at the same time.

Chancellor Nolan looked at the charred phone that contained the flashbang. "Jenny, as in that old song from the early 1980s about the phone number?" Jimmy nodded. "Wouldn't Manfred Mann's _Blinded by the Light_ have been more apropos?"

"Hey, you make your own running gags, we'll make ours," Jimmy replied in mild irritation as he retrieved his gun. "By the way, that's a Bruce Springsteen song."

"But which version is better?" Nolan countered with a smirk.

Jimmy rolled his eyes as Alex and Carina retrieved their weapons, and the group took off after Lightman, Pollard, and Herbert.

_**Unknown Location, London, UK  
**__**October 11, 2033  
**__**10:00 PM GMT**_

Chuck, Sarah, and John kept away from the opening as Lightman's men continued to fire at them. Casey and Verbanski held them off with their automatic weapons.

"Did you guys bring any more guns?" John asked in a state of panic.

"A whole arsenal, but they're out in the van," Casey replied. "Plus, we're a little busy right now."

.John crawled towards Casey and Verbanski. "No problem. Keep them at bay. I'll go get them."

"No, John!" Sarah replied as she pulled him back from the entrance. "You know what we went through to rescue you? I'm not letting you risk your life like that!"

"But Casey and Gertrude will run out of ammo sooner or later," John replied. "We'll all be dead if that happens."

Casey looked back at Chuck and Sarah. He then focused on Chuck's Intersect glasses. "Bartowski, Walker, get up here."

Chuck and Sarah crawled up to Casey and Verbanski. "You two cover us," Casey said as Verbanski and he handed Chuck and Sarah their automatic rifles and extra clips. "We'll run and get the weapons."

"Wait, what?" Chuck asked in shock. "You're a much better shot than me. And you know I have trouble with killing people!"

Casey pointed to his Intersect glasses. "Then aim carefully."

Chuck froze momentarily before figuring it out. "Oh, of course."

Casey and Verbanski readied themselves. Chuck and Sarah moved to where Casey and Verbanski were, and Chuck looked out over the terrain at Lightman's men. The IntComm downloaded the information he needed into his head.

"Three," Chuck counted down. "Two…one…now!"

Chuck opened fire as Casey and Verbanski sprinted across the road to reach their van. Chuck's aim was true, knocking several weapons out of the hands of Lightman's men while Sarah fired away at several other men who tried to charge towards them. Casey and Verbanski leapt behind the van for cover.

One of Lightman's men threw a grenade at the entrance to the warehouse.

"RUN!" Chuck screamed as the grenade landed in the warehouse. The three ran for cover, Chuck's IntComm spotting a steel storage locker. He grabbed Sarah and John and threw them over it as the grenade went off underneath a scaffolding, sending it crashing to the ground. Sarah and John landed behind the storage locker as the scaffolding fell forward, hitting Chuck just as he was about to dive behind the same storage locker. He fell to the ground and screamed out in pain as the scaffolding pinned him to the ground.

"Chuck!" Sarah yelled as she peeked over the storage locker. She was horrified to see Chuck not moving and his leg broken in two places.

Four of Lightman's men opened fire at Casey and Verbanski, pinning them back from opening the van, while the remaining men poured into the warehouse and surrounded Chuck, Sarah, and John.

_**Noell Street, West End, London, UK  
**__**October 11, 2033  
**__**10:10 PM GMT**_

Mr. Lightman walked down the alley behind the pub. His plans were ruined, but he wanted one last chance at revenge. However, getting out of the area would be problematic with the large police presence.

He stayed in the shadows as he approached the Metropolitan Police vehicle. He picked up a rock to throw at the wall and get the attention of the officer inside the vehicle.

"Who's back there?" the officer said when he heard the noise. He got out of his vehicle and walked down the alley. He never saw the flash of metal from the knife in Mr. Lightman's hand as it was plunged into his side underneath his vest. He fell to the ground. Mr. Lightman fished the keys out of the officer's pocket and got in his vehicle. He took off with sirens blaring towards the warehouse where John Bartowski was being kept.

The Bartowski family ruined his plans. He wanted to make sure he ruined their lives.

-/^\-

Jimmy ran down the street with his gun drawn, looking for Arthur Pollard. He was incensed they managed to get away and was determined to take him out. He then heard screams coming from the Oxford Circus station on the Underground. He descended the stairs and ran through the station as the few people riding the tubes at this time of night sprinted for the exits. He reached the tracks and found out why.

Pollard had a shoulder launcher aimed right at Jimmy's head.

"Mr. Murdock," Arthur Pollard called out. "This will be the highlight of my career."

Jimmy smiled. "More like a lowlight to me. Don't you just hate it when the good guys win? It's like you're on a damn TV show or something."

"Not tonight," Pollard replied acidly. "Even all of your skills can't stop a Skullbuster. I fire, and there's no way you can get out of range in time."

Jimmy shrugged. "That's true." Pollard gave an evil grin and fired. "Unless I happened to find your car before I entered the pub."

Pollard's eyes went wide when the Skullbuster didn't launch out of the tube. Jimmy sprinted in the opposite direction and dove onto the tracks as the Skullbuster exploded inside the launcher. Pollard screamed in pain as the electronic waves overtook him. He collapsed to the ground.

Jimmy slowly got up as his entire body shook from the effects of the Skullbuster. He pulled himself up on the platform and exited the Underground.

-/^\-

Samantha walked down the alley behind the shops on Hanover Street. Carina, Alex, and she managed to trace Natasha Herbert to this area and had the police cordon off the street. It astounded her to no end that their lives were about to end only a few minutes ago, only to have everything turn around. And as much as she tried to treat this like a mission, she couldn't deny she wanted revenge against this woman. Alex may have been right about revenge being a dangerous motivation, but it was serving her well right now.

Until she took a roundhouse kick to the face. She fell to her knees, and her gun fell out of her hands.

She looked up groggily to see Natasha Herbert standing over her with a wicked smile on her face. Herbert gave her another kick to the face, and Samantha collapsed to the ground.

Herbert kicked Samantha's gun far away. "You know, Michelle was just business," she sneered as she towered over Samantha. "But this I am going to enjoy to the fullest."

Herbert grabbed Samantha by the lapels of her jacket and threw her into the brick wall.

"My only regret," Herbert said as she approached Samantha. "…is that someone already killed your loser boyfriend."

Herbert reached down to grab Samantha again. Samantha's boot shot up and nailed Herbert in the chin. She staggered back as Samantha got to her feet with a fury that matched the red color of her hair. She spun and landed a roundhouse kick to Herbert's face, sending her back against the opposite building. She followed it up with a vicious hook, followed by a second and a third. Herbert snarled and tried to attack, only to get another roundhouse kick to her face.

"Nobody," Samantha growled as she landed a right cross. "…calls John Bartowski a loser." She landed a second cross which sent Herbert to her knees. She then landed her boot right under Herbert's chin, and Herbert was down for good.

Samantha felt unbridled fury run through her veins as she retrieved her gun and aimed it at Herbert's head. She cocked it and her trigger finger began to squeeze.

"Sam," a voice called out gently from behind her.

Samantha turned to see Carina standing there.

"That's not you," Carina said quietly.

Samantha stared in shock, even though her blood continued to boil. It was the last thing she expected her mother to say. "She killed….she killed my best friend. And she did it for no good reason."

"I killed people the same way when I started. And I didn't even care. But it takes something away from you and you won't even know it. It takes away your soul. Something I didn't get back until you came along."

"But…"

"I know you want her to pay. I don't blame you. But I don't want to lose you. And I don't think John wants to lose you, either. You have so much more than I did at your age. Please, don't make the same mistake I made."

Samantha stared at her mother. The longer she stared, the more she could feel her fury ebb. She safetied her weapon and walked to her mother. Carina pulled her into a tight embrace.

"I'm proud of you, honey," Carina said. "You did the right thing. Even if it doesn't feel good, sometimes you have to show you're the better person."

Behind them, Herbert shook her head clear and looked up at them. She then reached under her coat for her gun. She aimed it at the pair.

A shot rang out. Herbert fell back to the ground with a bullet through the middle of her chest.

Carina and Samantha stared at Herbert in shock. They then turned to see Alex behind them with her gun aimed and smoke coming out of the barrel.

"But sometimes, you do have to put the bitch down," Alex said quietly.

_**Unknown Location, London, UK  
**__**October 11, 2033  
**__**10:35 PM GMT**_

Sarah and John stood with their hands above their head as ten of Lightman's men surrounded them. Two men stood on each side of them. They could still hear gunfire from outside as the remaining members of Lightman's men continued to fire away at Casey and Verbanski.

"I hope you realize your meal ticket has been arrested by now," Sarah said to sow a little discord in the people in front of her. "Kiss your big payday goodbye."

"Like we'll believe that," one of the men replied. "And even if that's true, we'll just collect our fee from you instead."

"We don't have a lot of money on us," John replied. He then saw his father move his head slowly behind the men in front of them. "But we do have something that you don't."

"What's that?"

Chuck pulled the Intersect glasses off of his head. He tossed them into the air and John caught them. Chuck changed the program on the IntComm as John put the glasses on. The IntComm flooded his mind with the proper program.

"Skills," John said.

He pushed off the shoulders of the men on each side of him to kick high and nail two of the men in front of him. He landed and then slammed those two men into each other. The others were taken by surprise, which was the opening Sarah needed to land an elbow at one man and flip him to the ground. She then send another one down with a vertical kick. One man tried to level his gun at Sarah, but John kicked the gun out of his hands and sent him down with a hook while Sarah thrust a palm strike at the thug behind her. John grabbed Sarah and spun her so she could take out the last two with a hard kick to their faces.

"How was that?" John asked.

Sarah grinned. "Like father, like son." She grabbed two of the automatic weapons Lightman's men carried. "Stay here with your father."

Sarah ran to the warehouse exit with both weapons at the ready. One of the men turned to fire at her, only to end up with a bullet in his shoulder. He fell to the ground in pain.

"Drop your weapons!" Sarah shouted as she trained her guns on Lightman's men, taking them by surprise. Casey and Verbanski quickly opened the van and took out rifles of their own. "Now!"

Lightman's men stood for a moment but did nothing. One of them decided to raise his weapon at Sarah. It was the last thing he ever did as he took a shot through the middle of his forehead.

"Anybody else want to piss off Mama Bear?" Sarah asked defiantly.

-/^\-

"Dad, hang on," John told his father as he stepped back and surveyed the warehouse. The Intersect flooded his mind with various objects and physics equations. John ran to get a steel girder from the other side of the downed scaffolding. He then found an industrial-sized toolbox and placed it next to his father. He then placed the steel girder over the toolbox and wedged it under the scaffolding to make a lever. He grabbed a length of rope.

"Hang on to this," he told his father. Chuck hung on to one end of the rope as John took the other end to the opposite side of the girder. He lifted his foot up as high as he could and pushed down hard on the girder. The scaffolding lifted slightly off the ground, but it was enough for John to pull the rope slowly and extract his father from underneath it. He let the girder up slowly, and the scaffolding dropped to the ground again.

"Dad, are you OK?"

Chuck nodded. "My leg hurts, but that's fine. You did great, son."

"Thanks." John then heard the sound of a siren coming from the opposite end of the warehouse. "I'll tell them to call an ambulance."

John ran out of the warehouse and saw a Metropolitan Police car pulling up to the warehouse. He waved at it, and it pulled up to him.

"Officer, my father is…" John was interrupted by the IntComm processing who the man was. John froze in shock. "You're David Lightman. You're responsible for all of this!"

"And you're a dead man!" Lightman screamed in rage as he pulled out his gun. The IntComm quickly flooded John's mind with instructions, and he backflipped away from the car as Lightman fired. However, the IntComm wasn't fast enough, and the bullet caught John in the shoulder. He fell to the ground clutching his shoulder.

"Now I can finish the job." Lightman started to get out of the squad car, only to have to duck back in when gunfire hit the car. He looked up to see Casey and Verbanski running towards them. He gunned the engine and sped away. Casey and Verbanski fired until they emptied their clips.

"John!" Casey said in shock as he saw blood coming out of his shoulder. "Hang on, we'll get an ambulance."

"Dad, too," John whispered in pain. "Dad, too." Verbanski took off her coat and pressed it against John's shoulder wound. Casey kept his legs elevated while he ordered an ambulance for Chuck and him.

_**MI-5 Headquarters, London  
**__**October 17, 2033  
**__**10:30 AM GMT**_

The memorial service had just concluded. The gathering was small, as only a few people were authorized to attend. The majority of the crowd were John's family and friends, as well as Samantha and Chancellor Nolan. The anonymous star that represented David Lightman had been taken down last week, Chancellor Nolan keeping to his promise of not waiting until morning to remove it. However, four new stars were added. The three agents who were cut down by Daemon were now on the wall, as well as Michelle Travis, who was honored for having died in the line of duty even though she was still a student.

"Agent Collins, I wish to thank you for your dedication to preserving His Majesty's Government and the people it serves," Chancellor Nolan said solemnly. "I deeply regret it came with such a heavy personal toll for you."

"Thank you, Chancellor," Samantha said quietly.

"I know you'll honor Michelle and your fellow agents with your talents and bravery for many years to come."

The Chancellor shook her hand and then turned to John Bartowski. "Mr. Bartowski, I know this wasn't your fight, but His Majesty wanted me to convey his personal thanks for your help. It is a great comfort to know the Bartowski name will continue to symbolize bravery and dedication for another generation of your family."

The Chancellor then placed a small medal with a red ribbon in John's left hand, his right still in a sling from his gunshot wound. "He decreed that you be awarded a Member of the Most Excellent Order of the British Empire."

John stared in surprise at the medal. "Wow, this is an honor." He turned to his parents. "Have you guys ever gotten one of these?"

Everybody shuffled their shoes a bit. "Um, we all have, John," Chuck replied as he balanced himself on a set of crutches. "Alex and Jimmy are Commanders. Casey and Gertrude are Knight Commander and Dame Commander, respectively. That's a higher rank than a regular Commander."

"Which he never lets me forget," Jimmy grumbled.

"And your mother and I are Dame Grand Cross and Knight Grand Cross, which is the highest honor you can be."

"Which they never let me forget," Jimmy grumbled again, although the smirk on his face told John he was just kidding.

"So mine isn't all that special?" John said.

Sarah grinned and gave her son a hug. "John, yours is the most special of all. We received ours for doing our jobs. You earned yours for being brave and resourceful when you're only supposed to be going to college."

John smiled. "Kind of hard not to be that way when I grew up with the people in front of me."

"That's certainly true," Sarah replied with a nod. "Although I'm sure your Dad will appreciate the full scholarship the government gave you for Cambridge even more."

"Nerd will probably spend it all on a new computer," Casey muttered to break up the discussion. "You still have a 1:00 PM Econ class to attend this afternoon. Right, John?"

He rolled his eyes. "I can always count on you to prevent me from enjoying a day off, Uncle Case."

"We'll meet you at the car, John," Chuck said as everybody walked away from the Memorial Wall, leaving John and Samantha there.

"So, back out into the world?" John said with a grin. "Fast cars, cool gadgets?"

"I wouldn't mind a fast car, but we seem to do quite well without cool gadgets," Samantha replied with a grin. "And on missions, too."

John laughed heartily. "Well, I'm no expert in that field, but I do try my best."

"And now His Majesty's Government knows how good your best is. Better be careful, John. I'm sure your mother can stop your Aunt Alex from recruiting you, but how much pull does she have with Chancellor Nolan?"

"She won't have to," John replied confidently. "I am still a college student. Although the thought of us fighting the bad guys together is very tempting."

Samantha wrapped her arms around his neck. "It always will be. But I'll be here no matter what happens. After all, you'd be a tough man for me to get over."

John smiled as he gazed into Samantha's sky blue eyes. She pulled his face to her and their lips met. Their kiss may have lasted only seconds, but it felt like forever in their minds. A forever both of them wanted to share.

"Be careful out there," John whispered. "Don't be a hero, just be you."

Samantha cradled his face in her hands. "I will." She kissed him on the lips one more time and planted a few more along his cheek. "I'll see you soon."

They stepped back from each other, and Samantha squeezed John's hand one last time before she walked down the hallway, reaching the elevator and touching her ID to the scanning plate to open the doors. John gave her a gentle wave goodbye as the doors closed. He then turned and walked to the car where everyone was waiting.

_**Unknown Location  
December 19, 2033  
**__**3:30 AM**_

Mr. Lightman spent another sleepless night on the rickety cot in a hostel somewhere in Eastern Europe. It was one of the few places he could blend in and not worry about the world-wide manhunt for him. It was also one of the only places that didn't require a lot of money.

Thanks to Tyler Cook providing a litany of information to the SIS to avoid a lifetime in prison, Lightman's bank accounts were frozen and even using a computer could raise red flags. The only thing he had now was time. And he had plenty of that to consider his next move. He vowed to rebuild his empire. He vowed he would be powerful again.

But most of all, he vowed that John Bartowski and Samantha Collins would pay for what they did to him.


End file.
